As much as I would like to believe this poll as if you take into account as Kara's winning the amount of people who actually watch Strictly on that poll was only around 730 not enough to tell anything other than guess work, i'm afraid!

All I can base it on is previous years and since series 4 the DS poll has accurately predicted the winner in the lead up to the final. Not that it definitely will this year but it has for the last 4.

That sounds like a reasonable statement to me. Of course it's not a guarantee, but it's certainly an indicator.

Interesting; I'd assumed Matt had it sewn up based on the bookie odds, but now I look at Ladbrokes, Kara's the favourite at evens (Matt's at at 6/4 and Pam's at 9/2).

So that's another indicator that Kara's moved into the "Likely winner" category.

Not sure I would set too much store by the DS poll of the last four years tbh. All four, possibly with the exceptions of Hollins were pretty obvious winners anyway.

There isn't an obvious winner this year.

Exactly. Although I think Chris was the most obvious of all to be honest.

In terms of sheer popularity, yes he was.

Mark wasn't an obvious winner. You could work out mathematically that Matt had polled higher than him at least once in the weeks running up to the final. Other than Series One, it's the only previous final where I've not gone in 100% sure of who was going to win.

Rightly so.


Let's look at the numbers...

- 2020 total with an online survey - how were these selected?

- 36% admit to watching Strictly. So we're down it 724 people already.

- 946 then name a preferred candidate. How did they select which names to list first (was it randomised)? Over 200 more than actually watch Strictly? How? Are they suddenly going to pick up the phone, know the numbers and the times to call? Over 200 who haven't watched the couples' 'journeys'?

By page 10, we're down to 682 who watch Strictly and have a preferred candidate.
Stats there (as quoted):
Kara 28%
Matt 28%
Pamela 25%
Scott 14%
Gavin 4%

Now, 682 is not a terribly big bunch of people to give five different options to and present them as the views of the nation (not that I'm saying they are doing that). I certainly don't think the smaller categories mean much, some of those sample sizes are as small as 3 people. 3?

Gavin scoring so low compared to Scott is an irregularity considering the public vote put Scott in the bottom two last week.

As others have said, it doesn't take into account the behaviours of those who actually vote rather than just watch.

All in all, I think the numbers are interesting but I don't think there's much validity in them.

http://www.icmresearch.co.uk/pdfs/20...ictly_poll.pdf

page 8, out of 594 who watch Strictly and named a celebrity:

Matt 25%
Scott 24%
Ann 11%
Kara 12%
Felicity 6%
Pamela 12%
Patsy 5%
Gavin 4%
Michelle 2%
Jimi 1%

It appears, out of this sample size, Matt and Gavin's vote percentages haven't increased and Scott's collapsed while Kara and Pamela's have increased.

Interesting, yes. Valid? Who knows?

Does this tally with footygirl's revelations?

These figures would indeed tie in with the earlier reports of voting order. The more recent poll suggests though opinions have changed. It will be very interesting to see who wins now and how accurate these polls turn out to be.

Footygirl makes up her 'leaks'. so I doubt it.

As for the ICM poll. These are a professional polling organisation who if they're 3 or4% in a General Election, it's a disaster for them,
I've seen DS polls 20 or 30% away from the final result..

As for sample size. A carefully selected random sample of 624 viewers is more than enough to get a reasonably accurate idea of how people are actually voting on the show.

I'd take that over a self selecting internet poll with over 10,000 votes.

In SCD6 Tom led in the final 2 DS polls by the following percentages:
39-33-26
46-31-23

Tom won not because he was smart but because Tess misleadingly and unlawfully said "vote to save your celeb from the dance-off". This happenstance of 3-3-1 plus Tess led to the scapping of the dance-off which would almost certainly have evicted Tom given his dance earlier that night.

In SCD7 Chris led in the final 3 DS polls by the following percentages:
48-32-11
52-28-20
58-41

In SCD8 Kara is leading this week:
66-23-11

Kara's current 66% lead has not been seen since Alesha-vs-Matt di Angelo, and seems too huge a lead even allowing for ifs and buts. In a general election this would presage a landslide victory, but Strictly is not a general election. In the case of an overwhelming favourite, supporters tend to cast about looking for things which can go wrong.