Certainly Sid. Hope this works:

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/forums/s...d.php?t=938446

Most of the girls are collecting the same level of votes, except for Christine who is ahead of the bunch. Tom and Austin are leading.

Cheers a million VL x x x

Those figures aren't overly damaging to Rachel's chances as I had a feeling the two boys would be most popular and Christine (who I'm also fond of) gets a lot of publicity on The One Show.

Didn't expect Tom to be ahead of Austin though - that's a shocker!

I'm surprised at that as well, although Austin was second on the leaderboard that week and so his fans may not have felt they needed to vote (same for Rachel who was top).

For a number of reasons, Alesha was an exceptional case.

Rachel is getting much more standard treatment.


I think you underestimate the extent to which people will stick to their existing beliefs. Besides, despite what many seem to believe, she isn't wooden in the way that Gethin was last year and would not be transformed in the same way.

Hi flashgirl,

I agree that the 'jealousy' argument doesn't hold water as Alesha proved very popular and Christine (who I believe is the best-looking lass this year) is clearly attracting a lot of votes.

However, Rachel couldn't have sold the Rhumba any better. She didn't merely dance it with her feet and body, she danced it with her soul too. I think we need to accept that she's not the most extroverted character, but that doesn't stop her from connecting with the audience with her dancing.

I think it's not favouritism that should worry Rachel, but the opposite - with the Judges turning on her.

The Judges have well paid, primetime jobs on a very popular Saturday night show. They would all be loathe to lose this. I'm sure the Judges and Producers of the show have been stung by all the criticism aimed at them and perhaps are fearful of the BBC making changes to the Judging panel and thus losing their high profile jobs. Hence, all the nicey, nicey comments to the dancers yesterday.

Now, I'm guessing the Judges are or will be made aware of the People's report on voting figures. And if they believe these figures they may start to promote Austin and Tom, thinking that by giving the public what they want, they're less likely to antagonise the public further and maybe pacify a few unhappy BBC executives. And it wouldn't be difficult to do as all three Austin, Tom and Rachel are dancing to a similar level.

Next week, I will be looking to see if they start to undermark and criticise Rachel unfairly again, whilst heaping unjustified praise on Austin and Tom.

Maybe my mind is working overtime, but I expect the Judges (like most of us) are interested in only looking after themselves.

Hey Sid

Oh I agree. I think I said on the previous page (might not have done though, can't remember!) that her rumba was the only one dance of hers I've really liked, because I think it's the only dance she's really 'performed'. My point was that I wish she'd inject the same level of performance into her other dances.

I think her rumba was so good because she really connected with the dance. What Vincent needs to do is find a way of either getting her to connect with other dances in the same way, or getting her to act her dances better. Gethin wasn't hugely extrovert on the dancefloor at first and Mark Ramprakash was as shy as they come, but Camilla & Karen managed to get them to be good performers. If Rachel did what she did in her rumba in all her dances, then I think she'd be amazing. At the moment though, it all falls flat for me and most of her dances feel very dull and lifeless.

For me, what made people like Alesha, Jill, Mark R, Zoe, Gethin etc so good to watch was that they were not only very good dancers but they really went out there and sold every single dance (though admittedly it took Mark and Gethin a while to warm up!). Even Matt D'A, who I disliked more as the series went on, was great at selling a dance. That's what Rachel is failing to do for me and therefore why I don't really enjoy watching her.

Quite. They have a financial stake in the tour which follows. Both Rachel and Tom are doing the tour. Austin and Erin are not. It's not rocket science to guess who will be in the final.

I agree because Judges marks can only get you so far......but doesn't it all depend who John's voters vote for?

Or not making the choreography so difficult that dancing it requires too much concentration.

I think that's been a problem with a number of their dances this year, inluding the jive.

But the rumba and foxtrot seemed to lack excessively complicated bits, and were all the better for it, imo.

So much for my theory. Wasn't aware that Tom and Rachel were doing the tour.

Clearly, I was barking up the wrong tree. And it was unfair of me to impugn the integrity of the Judges. They are as impartial and even-handed in their scoring as ever

Go Rachel and Tom.

Alesha was very unusual in having female support. I put it down to her being not a classic sex symbol in the way that Rachel & Kelly are, the fact that she'd been cheated on by her husband & dropped by her record company & . All added up to her being less threatening to women.

Female voters have bad form for supporting pretty women. Zoe, Louisa, Emma & Kelly certainly didn't have the popular support they deserved.

Are you thinking that people who might go to shows on the tour remember exactly who was in the final or not and base their decision on that?

It may matter who wins, but I doubt it matters very much whether someone who doesn't win makes the final or goes out shortly before. It could even be better to go out shortly before, if it's memorable in some way.

Exactly. Alesha was much more of a girl's girl. Whereas Rachel has always been a male pin-up & has an adoring fiancé on the side, to boot.

I would agree with this. I do however think Emma was a girls girls too and hugely popular in the spice girls but like Rachel didnt have a huge fanbase on strictly. Maybe it is partly down to the judges. No one minded Rachel getting 39 for her rhumba but getting 40 for a foxtrot was a bit extreme. Even Alesha who some claimed was the judges favourite never got a 40 for her stunning waltz.

I like Rachel but so far her best dances have all been the slow pasionate ones. She needs to inject a bit more of a performance into her other dances. It will be interesting to see how she copes with the cha cha and tango where performance is a lot more important then footwork IMO.

How do you say the public don't like her. All the polls place her as the favourite female with Christine in second place.

In order to win you have to reach the final and I think most publicists will tell you it is good PR to have the winner and finalist/s in the project.
How do we promote films [starring Oscar winner/nomineee etc] or any event [award winner/Olympic finalist etc, etc]? Sorry to burst the bubble but merely taking part doesn't sell the jam in marketing terms.

Well, Rachel, it appears, only signed up a couple of weeks ago. Coincidentally, at around the time the judges first noticed she is such a great performer, as it happens!

Great user name. You have sooooo hit the nail on the head.
shocks yet to come. The real test will be when rachel and austin or tom in the dance off. dont get the argument either about acting classes - she's been having them for years in her previous life in S club 7, when they produced all those teen dramas, also when she tried to crack the USA!

Films are competing with other films; SCD is not competing with another SCD. I doubt that many who are inclined to see an SCD tour show care a lot about whether the non-winning celebs happened to reach the final or went out a week or two before.


If people really believe SCD is corrupt in that way, why aren't they making a bigger noise about it?

Instead, that sort of conspiracy theory seems just to be used opportunistically to attack celebs that someone happens to dislike.

I find it quite sexist and patronising that people have to come up with reasons Alesha wasn't threatening to female voters as though the entire female population is exactly alike and all of them are seething with hatred at any attractive female on tv, I think a lot of the time people are more likely to vote for people that they fancy which is most likely to be male contestants since most of the voters are women. Also why does it have to be hatred or jealousy? It could well just be apathy that led to people like Rachel & Emma not having much public support, neither of them are particularly exciting performers and just like in real life sometimes you warm to people and sometimes you don't, there doesn't have to be a reason for it.

I think it was always going to be difficult for Rachel to replicate what she achieved in the Rhumba, performance-wise, in the Foxtrot because the two dances are so different.

The Rhumba is all about interplay and sizzling sexual chemistry between the couple, wheres the Foxtrot is about grace and elegance which Rachel gave me last night. I'm sure an expert will correct me if I'm wrong, but the Foxtrot also strikes me as a dance where the emphasis is more on technique and foot-work than performance.....

I have plenty of female friends who couldn't take to Kelly Brook but love Rachel - so this argument about young, attractive pin-ups alienating female viewers isn't washing with me.

Alesha is just as pretty as Rachel and they are both pin ups for males so i dont think women as a whole are jealous or threatened of pretty women.
Thats just a consipiracy theory. I think rachel can win it this year.

When was Alesha a pin up before SCD? I know she did FHM after.