Fearing The Worst For Kirst

Oct 16, 2015 by Rob

The dream start to this series of Strictly continued last weekend with Anthony (advised at 9-2) becoming the 2nd elimination of the series, after Iwan (advised at 9-2) departed the previous week.

Jay also powered into Outright favouritism, currently a best price of 11-10 (advised here at 6-1 e/w pre-series) after a stunning jive which has to go into the Strictly Hall Of Fame as one of the best routines ever performed in the history of the show.

Of course, there is a long way to go until the Strictly final on Saturday 19th December and rest assured producers will not want this series to turn into a procession.

This week’s dances are as follows:

Ainsley and Natalie will be Waltzing to What a Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong
Anita and Gleb’s Hips Don’t Lie as they Samba to Shakira
Carol and Pasha will Paso to Trad’s Espana Cani
Daniel and Kristina will dance the American Smooth to Frank Sinatra’s Fly Me To The Moon
Georgia and Giovanni will Quickstep to S Club 7’s Reach
Helen and Aljaz will Salsa to Doctor Beat’s Miami Sound Machine
Jamelia and Tristan will do the Charleston to Straight Up by Scott Bradlee’s Postmodern Jukebox
Jay and Aliona will Quickstep to My Generation by The Who
Jeremy and Karen will Jive to Bobby Darin’s Splish Splash
Katie and Anton will perform the Viennese Waltz to Elvis Presley’s If I Can Dream
Kellie and Kevin will Foxtrot to Dream A Little Dream by Mama Cass
Kirsty and Brendan will Paso to U2’s Beautiful Day
Peter and Janette will dance the Tango to New Order’s Blue Monday

Georgia endured a tough time of it last Saturday with her pro partner Giovanni getting a dressing down from Len for a rumba lacking content and not taking the judges’ criticism well. Katie suffered even more, scoring a very poor 20 for her CCC, Anton acknowledging he was at fault for poor choreography.

These sort of episodes usually see something of a bounce back the following week, and both Katie and Georgia have the ideal chance to shine tomorrow night performing ballroom numbers, with both looking good in training VTs.

Georgia – 4/9, 6/15, 6/14 – has had a worse run of starting order positions to date compared to Katie – 6/9, 13/15, 3/14 – and Georgia has the more uptempo tune which could mean a first pimp slot for her.

The show usually likes to finish with an uptempo crowd-pleaser. Jamelia, dancing Charleston, is possibly another one in contention to close the show, whereas Helen (salsa) and Anita (samba) have both already received the pimp slot in this series.

With regard elimination, while Carol, Jeremy and Daniel could well find themselves at the bottom of the judges’ leaderboard, there are grounds for optimism all 3 can again escape the bottom 2.

Jeremy has already built up plenty of goodwill and a jive to ‘Splish Splash’ looks primed to consolidate that support. You also get the impression producers want the ‘Craig-not-scoring-Jeremy-higher-than-a-3’ narrative to run and run, until he gets at least a 4, at which point there might be a sense Jeremy’s journey is over.

Daniel appears to have a legion of loyal fans who will vote for him regardless of performance and an AS to ‘Fly Me To The Moon’ could well be catnip for the older ladies who love his blarney.

Carol, meanwhile, did very well to escape the bottom 2 last week despite being anchored to the bottom of the judges’ leaderboard and overcoming trap 1. Among this year’s female cast, you start to wonder whether Carol might even be polling among the top 2 or 3.

Despite her smiley, mild-mannered disposition not being a natural fit with such a moody dance, her paso will at least be set to a stirring tune and she should be in line for a later slot tomorrow, possibly later than Kirsty, also dancing a paso.

Keep a close eye on the judges’ leaderboard, however, because if there are no ties (there were 2 last week), it makes it a little harder for the last placer to rise up out of the bottom 2.

Kirsty has been far from convincing up to now, a paso set to ‘Beautiful Day’ doesn’t sound a natural fit, and she has looked ill at ease in training. She could have finished bottom of the public vote last week and still escaped the bottom 2. Tomorrow night, at least pre-show, looks a lot harder for her to produce a Houdini Act.

Ainsley, after being bottom 2, should get a scoring boost and a waltz will give Len the chance to reward technical elements to do with the required footwork of this dance which Ainsley appeared to be getting right in training.

It is logical to conclude Jamelia is most at threat of landing in the bottom 2 tomorrow night having been in the bottom 2 with Iwan two weeks ago. However, a Charleston is usually an entertaining, vote-winning dance and it could well be in the narrative for judges to continue to focus on her improvement.

Also, you have to wonder if the PC-obsessed BBC will be uneasy that 3 of the first 4 contestants to be in the bottom 2, have been Jamelia, Ainsley and Anthony, which could make them extra determined to help steer Jamelia clear of the dance-off tomorrow night.

On balance, it points to Kirsty being most in danger this week, more so given 2 male contestants have exited so far. There isn’t as much value left in her price now as there was earlier in the week but she would still be the pick for 3rd elimination.

While Jay has looked excellent in training dancing the quickstep and could be hard to beat for highest score, he had the pimp last week and could be brought back down to earth slightly tomorrow night.

The highest score each-way value with Coral looks to reside with Katie (5-1), Georgia (9-1) and, whisper it, Jamelia (100-1). Never be put off by a huge price and stranger things have happened before on Strictly – Pixie being eliminated in the last series when she was priced at 100-1, for example.

Keep an eye on Comments below for price updates and in-running opinions.

Advised:
Kirsty – 3rd elimination – 100-30 – 3pt win – Stan James