I can quite understand that John has had enough of SCD this year (and that he has a holiday booked - source Jeremy Paxman ) but I do wish he had done it differently.

I personally wish he had done his dance on Saturday and then just before the point of the announcement (on the "Sunday" show) regarding this weeks voting said that he wanted to withdraw from the competition.

It would mean that the programme would have been slightly shortened - no need for a dance off but at least he would be the one leaving this week and we could have kept a three person final.

I do appreciate that there is no solution that suits everybody and that people who voted for John would lose out but that is the case anyway.

No. At least leaving bvefore he is allowing for a 'normal' show. Announcing departure during the show would hijack all the attention. (Plus why go through the hassle of the dance if he knows he is leaving)

Well I meant that his "announcement" could have been made (by Bruce possibly) just before we see them all lined up waiting for the results (except John obviously). So, as far we were concerned it would have been a perfectly normal show right up until then.

However, I do appreciate that the chances of keeping it quiet would be very slim. Might have worked in the days of the results show being on Saturday as in the past.

I find that very ironic.

G

So ask for votes while knowing they have no intention of staying.

Totally ridiculous.

People wanted him to quit, now he has people still aren't satisfied.

Except, of course, not being clairvoyant John may well have supposed there was a chance he would be in the bottom two and would be going in the normal way anyway.

On ITT he and Kristina hinted that this was their swansong; their dance ended with them apparently prepared to walk off without waiting for the judges comments, and the judges conspired not to be as critical as formerly in an attempt to deflect the sympathy vote.

Not being in the dance off probably scuppered all their plans.

Precisely. Anyone remember Kristina's look of amazement and 'No way' when their names were announced?

ETA:
Plus if John had said 'we're going' just before they announced the results, it would have thrown the Beeb into yet another voting scandal. At least by going now, if gives the Beeb time to sort out damage limitation, such as announcing refunds for anyone who voted for John last Saturday.

I thought so as I typed it!

He's already hijacked the attention for the Saturday show - all eyes will be on his farewell Waltz. He mentioned several times on ITT how "emotional" it will be, so the advance publicity is already well underway. The sight of the pretty Kristina sobbing quietly next him as he said it won't have hurt either.

Exactly. Plus we'd have had to suffer a plethora of threads with titles like "John has insulted those who voted for him", "John has thrown the viewers' votes back in their faces", "John has hijacked the results show" and on ...and on...and on.

He hadn't made his mind up on Saturday. He said he came to the decision at 3-4am yesterday morning.

Yes I do appreciate that the votes are a difficult area but they are going to refund the costs anyway and so they could have done so.

Perhaps a convenient "injury" before the dance off would have done .

I guess I just really really don't want another two person final

It wouldn't need to be a two person final were it not beyond the wit of the BBC to come up with an interim damage limitation plan. No reason why they can't scrap the public vote this week, roll over the contestants' scores until next week and have the public vote on the cumulative total a week on Saturday.

Not perfect - but far better to have a few hiccups now than screw up the final, dontcha think?

The problem is that if nobody goes there is no point in the "results" show. Personally I would be perfectly happy to have no results show this week and a 3 person final or for the final to be brought forward a week but that would cause problems for their scheduling and, in previous years, this has not happened so I guess it won't happen this year either.

Ah, but the clever bit (IF the SCD producers were thinking smartly of course ) would be to kid everyone that there WAS going to be a normal elimination, and at the very end of the Results show state that no-one is leaving this week and that the scores (viewers' votes aggregated with those of the judges) will be carried over.

It won't please everyone of course, there will still be shouts of "foul", "unfair", "con" but it could just work.