I loved the AS, and the AT was a superb attempt at the antithesis of her being. For me, never easy to please, tonight Ali and Brian covered themselves with glory and honour.

A democratic vote was taken and the result accepted (my alibi is that in Ireland we cannot vote). But Ali tonight won a special place in my heart.

I voted for Ali and Brian many times and got through ok I just loved their ballroom dance it was just beautiful. I am sad that they are out, though they had the occasional wobble during the course of the competition I felt they showed more personality and musicality than Ricky and Natalie who though technically ok in most aspects but there is no warmth coming through quite sterile and sometimes Natalie's smile looked painted on. As for Ola and Chris, he certainly makes up for his lack of technique with his personality and enjoyment for what he is doing and that makes him very entertaining, best dance for me was his charleston.

piper

I agree, plus she had top marks tonight from the judges, the dumb public strike again..

Chris was fine, entertaining and all but really shouldn't be in the final because he isn't as good as Ali and Ricky.

I didn't say that dance ability should be the only criteria, simply that I would expect people to pay some reference to it.
Do you not believe that how well the celebrities dance should have any relevance to whether they are your favourite couple then?

I never voted for her before but I voted LOADS tonight I never voted for Ruth Lorenzo before the night that she got eliminated, and I never voted for Rhydian before he lost the final, and I never voted for Louisa Lytton until the quarter final.

Think I should just STOP VOTING?

Seems like it might be a good idea. Save your money.

The public should be able to decide if they find one of the better dancers more exciting, dynamic, capable of more striking or difficult moves or better at selling a story. They should be able to think thats great choreography done well or that was simple stuff that told some other story. They can credit real journeys, effort and difficulties overcome . The show ought to be able to give them 3 or 4 good candidates to pick one from. In the same way as you wouldn't have the funniest or least in tune singer in asinging final there's no reason why you have to expand the choice of winners to include the ones with the funniest walk, look or catchphrase or exclude anyone with the wrong sex, accent or unexciting VTs.

It would be possible to keep the vote and the better dancers if they narrowed the purpose of the vote to saving the most popular of the weakest dancers. If they then did what they shoulfd have done and fixed things for three to always make the final too there would always be the two best dancers and someone else who was the most popular of the others. People could then vote for anything and anyone they wanted to get to the final. You wouldn't end up though with a final with only one good dancer in it where winning depends on who isn't there and what rule was changed when to avoid the most popular going out in a dance off.

What I consider relevant compared to the views of others is of no consequence - we are all entitled to our view without the need to justify it.

Of course, I was just curious as to what you thought. No need to justify what you think if you don't want to, but since this is a message board for sharing our thoughts I thought you might like to.

Lol, maybe you should! Please don't vote for Joe on X-Factor tomorrow!

The BBC deliberately killed Come Dancing. It was a family show, as SCD is at the moment, so they put it on after 11 pm in the last couple of years of its life and when they got the ratings down enough they 'canned' it.

I don't think they'd lose much of their audience if they threw out the public vote.

I'd say Come Dancing was more of a specialised slot ,rather than family entertainment,they were all competitive ,professional, dancers with excellent skills,this was their living,their profession.
Strictly apart from having dancing is all about non dancers being taught by the pros,and hopefully progressing,the celebs aren't there to take up dancing as a profession,hopefully they'll enjoy the experience and entertain the public,most of all entertain...it is after all light entertainment,and you are voting for personality too....hence the public vote

Ellie

Thing is, we don't really know how far ahead in voting Ali has been of Ricky. If the margin was small enough, it's hardly surprising that the added votes of the floating voters combined with her lacklustre performance saw her come last with the public.

That was anything but a lacklustre performance from Ali tonight and presumably she could have come second in the public vote? The fact Ricky was in the dance off last week when he was the best dancer that week meant extra people picked up the phone to keep him in this week. If it had been Ali in the dance off last week it could have been Ricky that went.

One just can`t tell how the votes will go from week to week - I was surprised Alesha was in the dance off against Letitia and then went on to win.

I don't think I agree. If Ali had been in the dance off last week I'd still have voted for Ricky on the strength of tonight's performances.

I think Ola and Chris have already won this competition just as Tom had by this stage last year. It is nothing to do with dance and that saddens me but it seems yo be what the majority of voters want. I don't know why they bother trying so hard to dance well as at the end of the day the public will vote for who they like regardless of ability

I have not disagreed with anything you have said.

In fact, over the years, I have been one of the loudest advocates of STRICTLY dancing, but as I am in a minority and have had it explained that this is an entertainment show where the public vote for their favourite couple, I have accepted it and am getting on with my life.

And this is what more or less happens.

Most of the celebs who will never be able to dance but are popular with the public, are normally voted out before the semi finals.

In the finals, we normally have 2 or 3 couples who are entertaining, have improved their dancing and are putting 100% into the competition.

At this point, it becomes more serious.

Do not be surprised when Ricky wins next week.

The British voting public is always slated and misunderstood.

I also think Ricky will win next week even though I am a Chris fan and didn't think it was a foregone conclusion that Ricky would go yesterday. I also think Ali & Brian were off their game last night. Before I'm slated their AS was lovely but I just think they seemed subdued for some reason or other.

I agree with Poison. Ricky could win. I would not be at all surprised.
Chris has come so far but, were I to vote, I might well 'phone for Ricky if he performs a tour de force. I am not that fond of him and his dancing doesn't inspire me but it might.

I am sure there are lots of viewers like me who, despite loving Cola, are pretty open-minded. You wouldn't think so though given the venom directed at Cola-fans. It's that sort of abuse that tends to make me unreasonably obstinate and defend the partnership so, if people don't want me to support Cola, perhaps we could be given more credit for being able to make up our own minds next week.

Ricky won't win. I confident that the GBP will vote for Chris. Regardless of Ricky's so called talent, I find Cola much more engaging and entertaining...and it's and entertainment show after all..... Chris for the win.

I voted to (dreading my phone bill) I agree about the dress and it seemed to me that Len was telling the public to vote for Ricky (we all knew that Chris was going threw).

If I'm awake enough to do the maths right...no, she had to come last. If she was second and got 4 points there was no way Ricky and Chris could have out scored her.

If ricki doesnt win it will ruin the series for me