I'm getting a tad bemused by the string of negative and nasty name calling threads and posts on here about Mark It all seems very personal and very odd for that.

From the perspective of 'The Apprentice' Mark is like a shining beacon and Daniel a complete failure. Daniel has set out his stall and made all sorts of promises but not managed to deliver at all. Mark is full of himself too but consistently delivers and as for being PM, as has already been said, Mark wanted to be PM last week but Daniel got it and won the task in no small part because of Mark's great salesmanship.

As in most years there seems to be more women than men at the bottom and the top with more men in the middle when you rate them.

Mark is better than Daniel but I didn't like how he dealt with the project manager issue. James did a lot better this week.

But out of the three of them I'd only want Mark in my team.

People in general like under-dogs, no matter how bad they are. Being a competent person who doesn't shout and gets things done is seen as a bad thing on the Apprentice.

If Mark doesn't PM this week he's out regardless of winning or losing. Same with Lauren.

Is Mark bright enough to see that? I doubt it.

I don't think I have ever been in the situation of wanting someone useless (Daniel) to survive longer than someone with ability.

So, that's quite an achievement by Mark.

I think I want him gone even sooner than James.

Yes, that's how I feel too

Is Mark bright enough? He may not be likeable but he's not stupid. And unless Sugar swaps the teams around, only one of Mark and Lauren can be PM.

Incidentally, Bianca hasn't been PM either.

Mark reminds me of Jim from a few years ago.

Yes he can sell a bit but his biggest strength is diverting the blame onto others and staying well out of any area that requires him to take a bit of responsibility.

I assume he'll be leading a task next week after having his card marked by Big Al. Should be fun to see if he can handle it.

He strikes me as someone who knows what cards to play and when. Unlike James who doesn't know when to shut his gob and can't handle working with women and treating them as equals. On one of the sales pitches he was one finger away from giving Roisin the "shh, don't talk, Judy" gesture. Extremely rude. No way can I imagine LS choosing him as a partner. He might keep him around in the process to piss off the other contestants though.

I'd agree with that. James is all about the now: make a sale, close a deal, busy, busy, busy. Mark is more able to take a step back and play the long game: pick and choose things he does well to build his credibility, keep onside with other genuine rivals (it's clear he thinks Daniel is no threat - he's not wrong), pick off the weak. Some people would call that being strategic, others would call him underhand and devious - in reality they're flip sides of the same coin, it just depends which side you want to view it from.

"Katie and Pamela, they're my apprentices, I'm giving them a lesson in sales."

He seemed quite good in the first few weeks, still decent on sales but he mostly just makes me want to puke in my mouth.

Mark is smart. He realises that there's a lot of 'deadwood' in there, and so he doesn't want to put himself in the firing line by being PM whilst there are so many other people there that could let him down.

When he has been in action though, he's not put a foot wrong. He's the all around candidate, and the guaranteed winner this year. I'd be willing to bet a lot on that.

Not that smart if he's getting called out by Sugar.

You can't guarantee him a winner till we see if his BP has legs.

I agree fred. I'g go as far as to say that he is the best candidate in a long while and if people could judge purely on his abilities as opposed to his perceived personality they would agree.

I agree. Mark is a smart cookie and he knows exactly what he's doing. He might be a bit of a snidey little sh*t but he's performing well in tasks and has a lot of nous.

He might not be a particularly nice person and I'd probably rather have a beer with Daniel than Mark but this isn't Big Brother and so being nice or nasty doesn't really come into it

Very good point. I do get the impression people are judging it like a popularity contest as opposed to 'best business person'. However having said that I've got no reason to believe Mark wouldn't be fine as an actual friend and that Daniel's bigging himself up side might get tiresome. However, that would be just a matter of personal taste. As far as business goes I'd back Mark over Daniel all day long

What evidence is there that Mark is good at business, except being good at hard selling face-to-face? Which is not a relevant skill to running a business, unless you're a small-time market trader?

I can't remember him too much from previous weeks, but one mistake stands out in my mind. In the YouTube task Mark was trying to persuade Solomon to choose the YouTuber with the lower viewers, to the point of saying that the blame would be on Solomon if he didn't listen. Solomon refused and won the task for that reason. He was perceptive enough to listen to Lord Alan saying that the task was all about numbers. If he'd listened to Mark they would have lost.

He put himself forward to be PM for the coach trip task but Daniel persaded the team he had more experience in the subject matter of the task....that was a bad decision by the team as it turned out although they were lucky enough still to win.

Delete , load of codswallop

So why was everyone congratulating Mark rather than Daniel...?

Yes it was amazing how forceful he was. His only offer to be PM was, "I took loads of these tours, when I was backpacking". For such a great salesman he did a crap job of selling himself, when up against an already disliked contender. Me thinks "he doth protest too much"

I think Mark did an excellent job of getting the team on side, the day started with him calling Daniel a liar, something must of gone on in the inbetween days. And even after winning seemed to like taking all the credit, even though that was the point he was attacking Daniel over.

Daniels not the brightest button, I would of turned around to the team and told them "It was my decision to form up the teams, so it was me that allowed you to shine in your roles on this task"

The big irony for me with Mark is that Aussies typically complain about 'wingeing poms' but he is the biggest moaner I have ever seen on the show. I get the feeling SA is aware of this and unless he has a killer business plan it may bite him on the backside sooner or later.

I'd bet a hell of a lot that he doesn't. I think Alan Sugar will be more wary about personalities especially after the likes of Katie Hopkins and Stella Creasy. Stuff about his unpleasant ruthless nature will get back to him.

He'll get to the interview stage on merit, I'll give you that though.

I think you mean Stella English. Stella Creasy is a Labour politician.