Steph Naylor tweeted last night during the sing off, she said, whoever sings 1st in the sing off is the one with the lowest votes and, The judges know which act has the lowest votes, so that is why they take it to deadlock. I have never noticed it before but, I will go through the last 5 shows and see if there is any truth in this. Gutted for Paul but, he will do the best out of them all. Pure talent doesn't fade away

There was a theory that the person always on Dermot's left (or it could be right) get's the boot.

That seemed to be the case a year or so ago

The website Sofabet pointed this out for a previous series (think it was Little Mix's year), but it's not always true. I think sometimes the judges can guess who's bottom of the vote.

The second act to sing in the sing-off has been saved every time this series and I think every time bar one last series.

EDIT: Actually yeah I think I'm thinking of LM's year.

Very Interesting indeed, I just assumed the producers told them on the ad break

Did Carolynne sing after Rylan when they were in the sing-off and so second? I was just thinking if these theories are true, why did the overweight producer (Richard?) have to scramble on the floor to whisper to Louis during their sing-off?

They are supposed to perform in order of who performed first on Saturday night, and the one that performed after is the one that performs second in the sing off, however they didn't do that when it was Stereo Kicks vs Chloe (they put SK on second even tho they performed before CJ on saturday).

I always thought it was who performed first on the Saturday show went first, but I've noticed they have changed it a few times so she could be right!

I'd also be interested to know that of all the instances where the judges make a decision, how often is it that they've saved the person who had the lowest votes. It would be quite telling of the manipulation of the show - the most prominent example being saving Cher over Mary.

It's an interesting fact if it's true, but it seems too transparant.

I thought the judges have screens in front of them, so couldn't they tell them which act has the lowest votes via the screen?

Is their anyway of confirming this? Can someone dig out some old voting figures and episodes?

There's a reason for that. the one who sings first in the sing-off is the one who sang first on the main show. The acts earlier in the show tend to be the ones who aren't as good (not always, but the acts tend to keep their best acts til nearer the end of the show)

As someone's already pointed out in this thread, everyone who's performed first in the sing off has been eliminated this series. I've always assumed the act that performs first in the sing off was the act who performed first (out of the bottom two) on the main show. However, that wasn't the case for Chloe vs. Stereo Kicks which seems a bit odd. I wonder why they switched them around?

As for this 'theory' going beyond the current series - it's not the case. In week one, two, three, six and nine of series ten, the act that performed first in the sing off was saved. Every week they performed in the order of their running order on the Saturday, so the Chloe vs. Stereo Kicks bottom two seems even more bizarre.

Going back further to series nine, in week one, two, four and five, the act that performed first was saved. Once again, they performed in order of their running order on Saturday...

As for the judges knowing the result before Dermot announces it, of course they do - or at least Simon does and he tells them who the rest of 'em who they'll be sending home. Even Dermot knows the act each judge will be sending home - just look back to Carolynne vs. Rylan if any of you have any doubts.

They're all in on it, and all of them lose any respect they had from me for going along with it. It often feels like they're laughing at us, as if they're all in on the joke and they're playing us like fools. The problem is, the show's so transparent now that the joke's on them.

The voting figures from series 3 onwards are on the Wikipedia pages for those series.

Off the top of my head, the record-holder so far is Misha B (or should that be Misha B2? ), who was saved an epic 3 times despite being bottom - against Sophie Habibis, against Kitty Brucknell ( on her 3rd sing-off) and then most notoriously against Janet Devlin.

Curiously enough, the following series I seem to remember every judges decision mirrored the public vote.

Although I can understand people wanting to believe the other judges don't know the result of the public vote, surely nobody thinks this is the case with Simon? He's one of the show's producers and is going to have the winner at least on his record label.

This is the second conspiracy theory that's apparently come from Steph's twitter. Yet there's no sign of either on her twitter

Yeah, it MOSTLY follows Running order on the Sat but there is the odd exception (Cher v Paije is one that springs to mind)

Yeah but that's because all but three sing-offs (The three involving Union J, iirc) went to deadlock and the other three the judges sided with Union J (Who finished ahead of Jade, District 3 and Rylan respectively anyway)

It doesn't matter if they know who is bottom. They will vote out who they want.

If Louis wanted to save Paul he could have done it. If not, he could have voted for Jay to stay.

The only thing out of his control was the peoples vote, whether he knew it or not.

I really don't think silly positions will get the message across.

This is 2014, I'm sure they are told over ear piece or a producer runs up to tell them during the ad break.

Last year, Luke's last 2 sing offs were both put to deadlock and he performed 2nd against Tamera and 1st against Rough Copy so :S How would Steph know anyway, surely they wouldn't tell the contestants that?

It does matter to an extent because if the judges always vote 3-1 to ensure the producers favoured act goes through then people will be wondering why is the sing-off never taken to deadlock. But if the judges know who is bottom and take it to deadlock then they are safe in the knowledge knowing who will go home.

Delete

That would seem a rather laboured way of informing them. Presumably they wear earpieces, which could do the job much more easily.

Nope, still makes no sense.

If they choose deadlock knowing who will go through, they might as well just vote that way.