Phewf! Aida, that was a close shave! We were both nearly caught out there! Foolishly failing to realise that our appreciation of Ali's all-round dancing skill, admirable work ethic and determination to give her all to this DANCING competition, were not reason enough to support her. What a waste of my vote that would have been. Perhaps I should go for a dancer who has consistently, in every dance and dance style, scored less than her. She can't dance latin. Silly me for not noticing.

I have seen the light

The point is Chris get's away with stuff that Ali or Ricky would not be allowed, shoddy posture and footwork .. and a screwed up face.
The waltz on saturday night was awful .. and then they bang on about the chemistry between him and Ola .. well yes, in the training room, but in the waltz .. he looked like a castrated cat for most of it.
But because the bar for him is set rather lower than the other two .. if he so much as remembers his routine .. that makes him somehow good.

His samba ... if you watched only him .. was awful too .. no bounce and hardly any samba steps.

Why should he get the same mark as Ali from Len!! Her routine was complicated and at best .. Chris's was on a par with Laila's .. and she got slaughtered.

Darcy has made this point several times .. Ola only gives him easy steps to do and that's not going to change anytime soon is it .. cos it's a winning formula obviously and anything bordering on a 'Ricky Whittle' would send him into dance hall hell.

I know he is popular for everything outside of the dance floor .. but the OP states that he is a better dancer than Ali .. and that is patently not true.

Well you are entitled to your opinion but I don't agree with it and nor do many others.

Some people are missing the point.
Perfect posture, turned-out toes etc etc - great for a dance contest but not absolutely essential for Saturday-night entertainment.

If I'm going to be entertained watching it on a Saturday night, then it blummin well is!

Yes, so the other Saturday night entertainment programmes will doubtless concentrate on things other than dance to entertain... SCD is dancing entertainment, so I think the dancing is kinda central...

The point of the OP was that Chris can do both ballroom and latin and Ali can only do ballroom .. which is untrue.

Quite.

Honestly, if people don't particularly enjoy Ali's dancing, then fine - but don't try and claim she can't do latin as she clearly can. She might not have quite grasped the performance to the level that some people might want her to, but she can actually dance it well.

Indeed.

She dances quite complex routines very very well. Routines that Chris wouldn't be able to remember let alone dance, so to say his Latin is better than hers is laughable.

Some people may enjoy watching him dance which is fair enough but he is not a better dancer.

This would be an argument for sending any passing toddler with attitude out onto the floor.

The trick is to get the attitude on top of the steps. Chris gets neither most of the time, Ola makes up for it by being rather special, Chris sometimes gets into excited schoolboy mode which just about looks lively enough. Ali doesn't get the attitude completely right and usually manages the steps when she hasn't been given far too many. It has to be said though that more weeks than not what she has done has fitted her music and whoever is picking that is determining that balletic Latin follows. Ricky can get both, but then he can look under-rehearsed and doing something that doesn't require much. He's also hardly more successful than Ali at putting emotional content in.

Ali's ballroom may be better than her Latin.

But her Latin is better than a lot of other dancers (and I mean those no longer in the competition)

Her Latin only looks "weak" because her ballroom is SO good.

Ali is about the best we have at the moment, not as good as Rachel or Lisa, but pretty good.

Her tango was neat and precise but was generally as fiery as a wet lettuce, I was a bit embarrassed actually. Not really looking forward to the AT..

Ali can dance latin technically very well, unlike Chris but she does need to perform them better. Chris isn't in the same class as Ali and Ricky and I've had enough of the 'cheekie chappie' routine. I like him and Ola but not over better dancers. And if good dancing isn't enough for an entertainment programme then go and watch XFactor drivel.

Ali and Ricky are far, far, far better dancers than Chris could ever be.

Chris is personable and charming, and has improved - but if I was voting, one or both of the first two would get my vote.

In my opinion Ali is weak at latin in comparison to Ricky or Chris who puts on a show. Ali doesnt connect with the public and she is supposed to let herself go but doesnt even though she is an actress. She could try to fake her raunchyness even if she isnt like that in real life but she has a problem. In hollyoaks she walked around in skimpy outfits all the time and had to kiss other actors but she cant do it on a dnace show in dances that entail her be raunchy.

Also people dont need to be sarcastic to MY opinion. I thought it was called freedom of speech after all.

I don't think Ali's latin is as strong as her ballroom, but it's certainly better than Chris's which can best be described energetic rather than authentic.

I'm also p*ssed off with SCD's obsession with raunch and I'd really rather not see Ali either being or faking obscene, lewd, vulgar smutty or crude which is what raunchy means.

I think Ali's issue with the latin is that she struggles to communicate the feeling of the dance and also (IMO) her movements lack a bit of definition to me. The movements are correct but they lack a bit of i don't know, 'snap'? I do think that was a terrible song choice for her samba as well, so that really didn't help her.

She is much better than Chris technically in both latin and ballroom. I like both Chris and Ali's dancing for different reasons.

Yeah she may be technically better but at least Chris is consistent at his latin unlike her. I would like her to be better as her ballroom is so good her latin lets her down but just because she isnt good at latin doesnt mean she isnt deserving of her place in the final.

Oh, so am I, Muggsy - I can't be doing with the half-naked wrigglings and slitherings as demonstrated by the likes of Ola, Kristina and that new redhead whose name escapes me - although Lilia manages to dance sensually without looking cheap. My husband adores her.

In Ali's defence, and speaking from personal experience, it's very difficult for a English-rose type blonde to 'smoulder' beside her dark-eyed, brunette sisters without looking ridiculously overdone and totally fake - and I might be in a minority of one, but I still prefer to see a dance performed beautifully to appropriate music and containing the right steps to any amount of pawing, gurning, bumping and grinding!