Just watching the Sunday show and realising that if it had been a deciding vote from Len, we would have had some issues.
His reason to keep Scott and Joanne in was that their foxtrot was more foxtrot than Alison and Aljaz's. All well and good except Alison and Aljaz's were doing an American Smooth...

Just think how messy that could have got!

In this instance, I'd have rather he were given the authority to make a "double elimination."

Yes, I don't understand what he was talking about. The same goes for when he said he woild have saved Dave instead of Mark last year.

I think he oftens says that just to make the departing couple feel better. He's done it a few times over the years when he's not been that fussed about the saved couple.

All American Smooths are ballroom based. In this instance Alijaz and Allison chose to dance a foxtrot based American Smooth. Len was saying that the foxtrot part of their dance was not as good technically as the foxtrot part of Scott's dance. I agree.

Happy for people to prefer Allison and to say that she should have stayed. But it is wrong to imply that Len does not know what he is talking about and cannot tell one ballroom dance from another.

I got Len,

Alison was doing a Foxtrot based American Smooth, Soctt was doing a Foxtrot.

Alison spent the majority of the routine just waving her arms about and her actual Foxtrot/ in hold content was poor. Scott meanwhile may have been bad but actually attempted and successed in some of the basic Foxtrot.

As the judges basically said, Alison was kept in due to her wafting arms

And 'added flourishes'.

(Which going by Craig on ITT tonight was basically showing her knickers)

^Ideally, this.

However, I really wish Alison had gone. Scott was on borrowed time from the start, especially with Craig's scores. Alison gets good marks for abysmal dances, and no doubt will get excellent scores for her Charleston when it'll still be absolutely dire and with almost no content (like her American Smooth, and Tango, and Jive, and Foxtrot...) and will probably survive, whilst someone better (and I include Judy in that, who actually attempts to dance actual technique and content, however badly she may do it!) will end up going home.

Nah, I'm pleased he didn't get the decider.
Len can make some strange decisions and looks for odd things in the dance-off based on his jumped-up 'I'm the ballroom expert, dontcha know?' attitude...
If the judges can't decide and it's a 2:2 tie, they should revert to public vote or points scored or something else. It's ridiculous that Len should be given the casting vote.

Surely the point is that if you do a foxtrot based American Smooth then it should be judged on the non-foxtrot bits as well as the foxtrot bits otherwise...why not just have the contestant do two foxtrots in a series? Other than not wanting to bore the audience into a coma I mean.

Kate Bush was famous for her style of dancing as well as her music so it would have been strange to dance that song without some of that choreography. Maybe Alison needed to get the foxtrot right first and then add the Kate Bush styling later.

Now that I think about it, what the heck has Wuthering Heights got to do with Halloween?

It was! Len said he couldn't separate them based on their performances as a whole and so as a final decider he looked at the common parts between the two dances.

Are you saying that you were so impressed by Allison's wafting that you think that should have clinched it for her?

Btw Ideally out of hold you are still doing mainly ballroom style steps and applying technique when dancing the out of hold parts of AS. It isn't really complete freestyle.

they were (apparently) doing a foxtrot based American Smooth

surely Len only gets the deciding vote if the judges are split 2/2............ so if, say, Bruno had voted Scott instead of Allison, Lens vote for Scott would have eliminated Allison as he has the deciding vote

or do I have that wrong?

Or, just show Craig yer knickers

Well at core yes, if we're talking about the performance elements that Len was apparently claiming were equal, Alison should have got more credit for performing wafty pseudo-contemporary twaddle (which has been the core of American Smooth on Strictly since 2009) reasonably well than Scott apparently got for standing there yelling QUACK QUACK and pulling stupid faces as Joanne hurled herself around him. Because the former involves some attempt at dancing and the latter involves absolutely none.

The merits of the 15 seconds or so of foxtrot Alison did vs the 35 seconds or so Scott did isn't really my remit obviously..

Len just likes to be controversial occasionally, especially if he thinks others are getting more attention.

The song is based on Heathcliffe's belief that the ghost of Cathy is haunting him. Any ghost = halloween in scd world.

I would have been furious had Len had the deciding vote!

How can Len judge it only by content?

Alison did an AMERICAN SMOOTH not a Foxtrot.

I agree entirely with what you have said.

Unpopular opinion but I actually thought Alison danced better than Scott in the dance off.

That is correct.

I think what had basically happened is that Len's random mood generator had settled on 'benevolent' (or 'patronising') and him saying that he would have saved Scott was in effect him giving Scott a pat on the the head and a lollipop and sticker for coming and being a brave boy in front of his mum.

Deleted - given up arguing.

Len's point about the foxtrot element was right, but I don't think for one moment he would have saved Scott over Alison had it really been a deciding vote.

I'm not convinced Len was telling the truth - I think once he knew he was outvoted he said that to make Scott feel better. As others have said, he has done it before.

Basically Scott was by far the worse dancer on the show and they had to get rid of him the first time he dropped into the bottom two for fear that he might not do so again!!

Alison will not last too much longer, she is completely flat footed no matter what is going on up top.

I agree that Len should not have the deciding vote. How he saved Simon over Thom is beyond me. If the votes are tied at 2 each then the public vote should decide matters.