Ice-cool Barnes likely to escape elimination for the time being

Strictly Come Dancing / Chicken Dinner / 01 November 2007 / Leave a Comment

Students of the dancefloor Chicken Dinner talk us through Saturday's Strictly Come Dancing 5th elimination market

After last week's shocker, does anyone know what to expect? The ballroom is all in a tizzy. The judges appeared to be infuriated and close to tears that their marking was completely disregarded by the public, but surely the eliminated Gabby Logan had simply tapped into the "middle-aged, female, and competitive" inner-demon that the public seem to deplore. Especially the competitive bit.

The trick with Strictly Come Dancing is to appear to be having a great time, but nothing more. The minute people smell gritty determination and a ferocious will to win, you might as well tear your dress off and go home - unless, of course, you're Jill Halfpenny (winner, series two). Gabby's downfall was the steely look in her eye, combined with the grace of Hercules in a frock. In the puzzling world of televised ballroom, the voting public clearly have a very fixed idea of what is acceptable female behaviour.

So now, it's a more a matter of the great dancers, Brook (55.0 on betfair to be eliminated), Dixon (55.0) and Di Angelo (44.0), against the personalities (Barnes (9.0), Dean (9.0) and the Blue Peter bloke (26.0). Lancaster (18.5), Littlewood (8.4), and Mr Logan (3.85) seem to be nothing more than dancing cannon-fodder, and the mystery as to how Kate Garraway (3.25) is still active continues. One of them should be next.

This week it's paso doble/foxtrot time. Doing the steamy Latin paso doble are Dean, Logan, Brook, Littlewood, and Di Angelo. The foxtrotters are Dixon, Garraway, Blue Peter, Lancaster and Barnes.

That could be good news for Penny Lancaster, who just avoided elimination last week, as the highest ever scorer in the foxtrot was Zoe Ball (38, series three) - her secret weapon was also having legs that could kick apples off a street lamp.

That said, last year, the foxtrot managed an average judge's score of just 26.5, compared to the paso doble's score of 28.5. The big loser then was the Casualty actress Georgina Bouzova, who scored 26 for her foxtrot (most similar to Letitia Dean), but was still turfed out. Eventual series winner Ramprakash high scored with his paso doble (35).

Is this the end of Garraway?

Series three featured GMTV presenter Fiona Phillips horrifying the judges by staying in despite her appalling inability to dance - like Garraway, she was the lowest scorer for every single week she was there (four in total). She was finally booted after a dreadful foxtrot that looked like slow-motion fighting. Garraway will be foxtrotting this week - might history repeat itself?

Three of the four 'stars' to be thrown out in week five have been women - Claire Sweeney, series one; Sarah Manners, series two; Jan Ravens, series four. The exception was Dennis Taylor, series three.

To read more about Strictly Come Dancing go to:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/strictlycomedancing/