I was convinced of it last week - and got flamed for saying so - but even more concinced after Arlene made a very personal attack on John about not training, and making derogatory remarks about Kristina's attire. It smacked of panic.

Yes, I too think he would have won - again, John's remark about 'this incredible machine' bears witness to the size of the vote.

What makes it more difficult for us to assess the situation is that we have no idea of the number of votes cast in total each week. Due to various factors such as never vote/only vote in the final/credit crunch etc, the total could be as low as 500,000 votes. Split that between 10/9/ 8 couples and it doesn't take a genius to see that even a thousand votes will make an enormous difference to the results.
e.g. 500,000 split evenly between 10 = 50,000
Take just 1000 off each of the others and add to John, makes John's total 59,000, and the others 49,000.
But if the total votes cast is further skewed by people multi-voting, so that it then becomes 500,000 votes cast by 400,000 voters - then it's quite easy for one person to get a high percentage of the votes.

I got the distinct impression that John himself thought he'd be out in the first couple of weeks like all the other "older" male competitors.

He seems genuinely amazed that he has lasted so long despite being bottom with the judges week after week.

The other 6 celebs would give their left arm to win.

It would not bother John to win by relying on the home vote, but as far as 5 weeks away from the Final the 4 judges (with impartial host Brucie plus evictee James joining in) mounted a witch-hunt which will get more shrill and nasty by the day.

John's non-combatant wife received an abusive phone call, no doubt the first of many. It is the 4 judges who made it unrealistic for John to receive on a plate the glitterball six others desperately want.

Before entering John never dreamt of the warm connection he and the exceptional Kristina would forge with 10 million viewers nationwide. Nor did he anticipate the intensity of spite and bitterness from 4 judges now half destroying SCD. After this Saturday's farewell dance I genuinely believe there will be a substantial switchoff nationwide. JICTAR will tell us afterwards.

When he agreed to the show, the last thing on his mind would have been winning. He is obviously very aware of his level of dancing, but what he couldn't have predicted is the amount of public support he's received, together with the derogatory comments from all and sundry, including judges and pro dancers alike. That wasn't why he was in it, so once he realised he had every chance of winning, with the better dancers getting evicted, he's done the decent thing and left.
To have a go at him for doing what a lot of people on here have suggested he should have done weeks ago is an interesting point of view to say the least.

Going on factors such as voting in previous years, John's age/weight/fitness level at the start of Strictly, etc, would anyone/producers/viewers/John himself seriously have expected John to last more than about 3 weeks?
John was invited to fill a certain role - the old no-hoper duffer - but then found that he was on a runaway bus.
I am absolutely convinced that he was hoping to go the week of the cha-cha (it lacked the spark of all the other weeks to me), but due to the judges doing their usual foot-in-mouth trick of completely slating him, John got a landslide of votes and was saved.
Then everything kicked off big time.

Colin was voted out in the final though so that doesn't necessarily prove that people know the voting figures whilst the show is going on.

I could believe that in fact they do find out once they are voted out, as it is generally known that Aled won the public vote for the first six weeks of series two, and possibly he was told that once he left (just to rub salt in the wound ). But I'm not sure that it follows that anyone would be told what others who were still in the competition were getting in terms of vote. If the BBC want this info under wraps, which they certainly give the impression of doing, then they wouldn't be giving it out to anyone.

I could just as easily believe that this is chinese whispers, and started by someone saying either that John was being saved by the fact that 50% of the competition is decided by the public vote, or that he was probably getting at least half the vote.

Here is a source saying that 9.5 million votes were cast for him. The Times Newspaper.

http://entertainment.timesonline.co....cle5193474.ece

I don't think John was supposed to last even until the merger.

But with the male celebs this year being generally pants he wasn't even bottom of the judges table until week 5, his third dance - and was back off the bottom again for week 6.
Even the next week when he was back on the bottom the actual scores were much tighter together. However, the next week hysteria seemed to set in and the rest is history.

He would have been prepared to win, or at least get to the final, had there not been such a frosty atmosphere backstage by some of the more straight faced supercilious people.
He was pulling in 40% of the public vote, not 50%. Of course he knew, he has sources.

Anyway it is all over now.

It's a different show now but it will go on. Less fun perhaps but I don't think John would want the controversy to go any further.

Deffo multiple voting then as that's about equal to the viewing figure, and that includes people like me who never vote.

G

On his ITT interview yesterday John was saying, quite vehemently, that he thought competing in the the finals against good dancers would be personally humiliating for him, whether he won or not. It seemed to me he meant the physical and emotional toll and the contrast in ability were the issues for him. It seemed he was realistically contemplating, probably for the first time, what reaching the final actually meant.

I don't think that article says that 9.5 million votes were cast for John - 9.5 million is the audience figure, surely. It's just badly phrased.

I think (not completely sure) that the BBC Controllor said 40% of the vote.

I think myself that John was told how big his vote was, and realised there was a SERIOUS chance he would win. As he said himself the vote against him was split several ways so it was a situation that wasnt going to go away.

I would have thought so... maybe I am severely underestimating John's popularity, but if not something very strange has happened in the voting figures, because most series have been earning between one and one and a half million pounds for CIN, which (with at least 12.5p per vote going to CIN) equates to between eight and twelve million votes over the whole series... and of that, a huge proportion are cast in the final.

So 9.5 million votes cast just for one person, in only eight weeks, not even including the final, doesn't ring true to me however popular he happens to be.

If it has come from the BBC that it was 40% or even 50% then I guess that is true though... still think it displays shockingly bad taste on the part of the public though! And yes, that is just my opinion!

Despite 9.5 million viewers having taken him to their hearts and repeatedly voted him through to the next round,

That's not saying 9.5 million votes for him, but that there are 9.5 million viewers., enough of whom voted for him each week for him to avoid the dance-off.

I do wish people would read the articles.

A typical DS thread that starts with a 'fact' and actually there is no evidence for it whatsoever.

The only piece of evidence I can see is Heather saying he was in the Top 3. Hardly strong evidence of him receiving 50% of the vote, infact the opposite.

According to Claudia on Tuesday nights ITT, Christine is getting huge support every week.
Maybe she was getting the other 50% of the vote

But then, they probably DIDN'T know the voting numbers...

You've mis-read it. The 9.5 million refers to the viewing figures, not the voting figures:

Sorry, but I don't believe this rumour, there's no substantiation apart from "Oh, I heard someone say it somewhere".

Which is about equal to "A man down the pub told me" in terms of plausibility.

That article in the Times says that the judges called him a dancing pig in cuban heels. That is untrue, so I dont have any confidence in the rest of it.