Last night on Ch 5's OK TV, presenter Kate Walsh - 2009's Apprentice runner-up - said she wanted Helen to win and she was a bit annoyed how the earlier tasks didn't have any bearing on the final week. She said Helen would have won had it been a regular series of the show.

I don't think she rated any of the candidates, well, apart from Helen. She was no fan of Tom.

The Badger, Liz Locke, Lee and the glorious Raef all backed Tom through the process.

4-1 kind of represents the popular view. Perhaps even it's a little more generous to Tom than the general one.

But Kate's opinion counts the most because I love her.

Gaaah! you win Tom will be distraught. But Raef was gorgeous, so really it might be a little bit of a draw, if we weigh up love and gorgeousness and do the numbers right.

Tom is a sexy geek! If geeky guys can be sexy, Tom is it.

But speaking as a straight guy myself, I have no idea why I typed that.

Kate was head and shoulders above that 4 above for goodness sake.

I would take her call well above that motley crew

To be serious for a moment, Save the Badgers.

I actually agree with her, based on the pass challanges, Tom was pathetic through out the show.

Had no balls, was weak, let everyone walk over him and he won.

Disgraceful ending to a okay series.

Tom deserved to win IMO - after all he did invent the "curved nailfile" what did any of the others invent ?? nothing !! They had lots of theories etc, but couldn't put anything into practise - Susan deserved second place, because at least she had run her own business !

You do Tom an injustice, he also invented Christopher Columbus the Englishman. Actually Helen was the co-inventor.

Oi! What about William Drake?

A lot of the better past candidates can read Lord Sugar well enough to predict what Lord Sugar will pick. Liz fell to his ani-corporate bias and Helen was mot like her. Ruthalso fell to someone who had set up a business and had a better back story. They could spot his anti-service bias and who was being kept on for TV and who had a dud final proposal. That doesn't mean they would want to work for Tom or employ him. Some share Lord Sugars liking for a pre-existing low risk way to make money selling something thats cheap with a big mark up - like the nail file. As one put it she could see pounds signs appearing when Lord Sugar looked at Tom and his heap of inventions.

Its a rather a false divide too. Kate and others supported Tom but finally thought Helen should win . There's a lot of twitter support for Helen, and quite a bit for Susan. Tom doesn't seem that well supported by this year's people who had to work with him, went instead of him, or who wonder what was the point when he won on something he had designed years ago.

Re the second BIB, I'm Amazed

Re the first BIB, it's very hard to argue that Sugar's likely response to the details of the business plans (service based or product based; small or big mark up) could have had any influence on the better past candidates' earlier choices. The plans weren't known till the final. As many have observed there was a striking disconnect between the process and the final.

Nope, my illustrious band backed Tom through the tasks (as a goodly sized chunk of the blogging business world also seems to have done) because they liked him and his potential as a creative individual. The fact that he had already brought a product from concept to market was a pure bonus.

She wasn't criticizing Tom, she was criticizing how the 11 previous weeks were basically pointless as the person who performed shockingly in all of them ended up winning.

His lordship it was, in the skincare task, who insisted on the importance of profitably selling service rather than selling product. He would not have minded Helen's concierge service proposal if only he could see realistic profits. It was another case of smell-and-sell: whichever option out of two made money, that was the option worth reinvestment.

Helen actually got a crucial forewarning from LS when she faced him in the boardroom after her team lost for the first time in the sell-restock-sell task. It was suggested that Helen as a corporate has no track record as a trading entrepreneur. Helen basically said she was dying to jump into business, that it was always her passion.

LS sceptically said to Helen's face, this was not something you jumped out of bed to do tomorrow morning. You needed prior experience in whichever line of business you set up.

Helen heard this but sadly did not twig it was a final warning. She went on to propose a concierge business entirely beyond her experience, only to hear LS recap that to start a business you needed prior knowledge of it.

It was not fatal that Helen proposed a service rather than a product, but fatal that she had no previous form in that sector. Helen had her chance but blew it, leaving LS in complete misery to see his brightest hope falter at the last hurdle.

On the night an awful lot of the past candidates called it in favour of Tom or Susan when they heard the proposals and some said Lord Sugar would go for the products anyway. Some speculated for weeks that he would go for Tom. Tom's business plan is, and eventually turns out to be, not that important at all. Whats important is that he has something in his CV on day one thats visible before anyone elses plan is known. Its got potential and can be picked up. If its not going to be a service Lord Sugar goes for, its going to be Susan or probably something he's less involved with like food - which is what he might expect from Zoe or Helen who seem also to be seen as candidates.

There is a question in there somewhere why he dismisses Glenn the engineer so abruptly and keeps Tom the inventor. Logically Glenn was he one who might have an idea like Tom's ,and there's no reason to think he's less competent than Tom in his field, so why dismiss him without knowing more?

The split isn't that solid in favour of Tom. If you look at more people you find Helen has support to win too. Some people, including Kate, change favourites and many think Helen is amazing, but the inventor or the product will win.

Tom was never shockingly bad. He just allowed himself to be intimidated by the other candidates. As much as I like him, there were times when I just wanted to shout 'man up!'

The thing is though until late on in the process he was often a relatively lone of voice of common sense amongst 5-7 others who couldn't see he was right about a lot of things - Susan similarly. It wasn't simply a matter of 'manning up' it is just a case of it being very difficult to impose your way thinking on 6 or 7 others who don't really know you and misguidedly think you're wrong. e.g. the cosmetics / beauty task.

Sometimes watching this series of TA has made me wonder whether we have genetically evolved to IGNORE people who think about things carefully in favour of those who shout really, really loudly? Its like as though if good ideas got excepted by everyone too quickly we'd not evolve rapidly enough to take advantage of them? So instead quite often we'll just listen to the loudest sitting guy around the tribal fire because they must have the right idea - right?

He did offer that advice. But its not that likely that you could do much in the bakery line with 250k and defeat the big chain competition. He would probably have said I don't want a bakers shop, in a recession, if offered something she had experience of. Helen looked for something new, but like Jim, she picked a complex service and didn't have much idea how to start it up. Its going to be difficult anyone proving an idea on paper can work, but she went for something too difficult anyway. That doesn't mean its an open competition though - he does say that he's a products man and he's already been dismissive this series of Edna and Melody who, whatever it is they do do, seem to make significant money from their services. Its difficult to see what service he would be interested in, given he prefers product, the finalists are not offering proven, set up, services and he's already fired the people with services that pay them money.

Go back a stage too, and there's question how Tom manages to get to the end over everyone else but Susan with a working business that produces a product. Glenn the engineer is dismissed for being an engineer - when Tom, the fellow engineer come inventor, doesn't have even as much success in the tasks. Zoe, who produces drinks goes - even when Tom the inventor has redesigned her product. Tom then wins with a dud business plan, on the basis of a product and range of inventions thats been obvious in his CV since day one. If you looked at the CVs on day one, and decided that you either wanted Tom or Susan, things would have panned out exactly as they did.

I don't want to appear churlish - but surely the edit is likely to reflect the story the producers want to tell? The finalists would have been known last year - assuming Sugar kept to the format before where the choice between the final 2 was only a few days ago.
Hence the story of Tom "the ignored voice in the wilderness" could easily be exagerated - how many other candidates warnings were left on the cuttingroom floor?

(Adopts thick Brummie accent) "It's a poirate parret"

But it wasn't the old format, it was the new format and Tom won on his own merit. I wish showbizzy people would stop trying to take it away from him by dwelling on this

Is this the Kate Walsh who has spent the last few years telling us what lady gaga had for breakfast this morning or what single the latest z list boy band are releasing?

And as far as I know no-one has ever stated "the candidate that wins the most tasks gets the job". There is a huge amount of luck in how many tasks you win and Sugar would be mad to base his hiring decision on how many wins someone has.

Helen won the first 4 weeks before most people even knew her name (as her contribution was so minimal and she was hardly on tv). It's all luck. It's what you do on the tasks that counts, not if you win them or not (unless you are PM and even then there is luck involved).

i would imagine that Lord Sugar will not be happy that the most high profile and successful ex-candidate is criticising the format

I doubt he`d really care tbh.