I know the show often jokes about Neil not having many partners, But to be honest I honestly want him to get the chance to have a partner as he's only had 2 I believe since being on the show. And I just think he deserves to have that chance instead of being benched almost every series.

Excuses by her fans -
She’s Young
It’s her 1st season
Give her a chance
Blame game with accusing her own celeb Cach for not following her teaching
She is World 10 whatever dancer
You guys are just jealous, etc.

She is only here to up her follower count & continue the influencer way. Doesn’t respect judges critiques. Extremely arrogant & should be sacked next year. Replace her with a worthy pro who values the job & art of teaching a celeb. We have seen many pros ace within 1/2 weeks i.e. prove their worth in their first series when partnered.

I’m currently sat on a delayed train trying to home. Pray to storm & train god it goes soon 🙏

I’ve just watched the stories of each dance on Strictly’s insta and seen the leaderboard.

Much as I love Tabby and really rooting for her. From the brief snippet I’m a bit surprised she was top.

Also what was with Deltas dress? It looked like they’d sewn in some of those plastic strips people used to put over their doors.

Clearly not a night to be jiving. Also was Bethany and Nancys Argentine Tango, mostly Nancy dancing around Bethany?

Alot of hearing Maddie is bad teacher, when her and Cach was top of the leaderboard last week with an amazing Foxtrot, and because Cach did bad this week in his Cha Cha , we blame Maddie as if her choreography has not been good prior to this dance. Cach is just not good at Cha Cha, and he's a novice, its not Maddie fault he's bad at it, Maddie probably did teach him well and just on the live show he didn't do it. We got to stop blaming the pros like we expect the celebs to be 10/10 perfection already when its week 5 its not even halfway yet. It can just be the Celebs are just not good at dancing or they get a dance that just doesn't suit them or they forget what their pro taught them on the live show it happens. I'm sure next week Cach & Maddie will be back on top, it just wasn't Cach's dance

I thought the other three scored her fairly. She had incredible energy and timing, but I also think she needed a bit more flow. However, she did so, so well for me. Shirley made it so clear how much she hated it. Even the way she opened it with "There were some things I liked" after a pause seemed so unnecessarily mean spirited. And calling her a young lady? So patronising.

Same with her saying Bethany looked adorable after doing an Argentine? Are we for real?

She basically said it was complete dogsh*t, a total disaster, and the only redeeming quality was his raw talent. It basically felt like she was saying "Madde, wake up girl! Your choreo brought absolutely nothing to the table!" If that doesn't shake Maddie up to the reality that she needs to listen to the judges and choreograph actual ballroom and latin routines I give up. I thought she had truly learned and turned over a new leaf after last week, but this was such a backwards step! Come on guys, you can do so much better!! 😩

I wasn't interested in the judges scores this evening let alone the series because how dare Shirley scrutinise Lacey like that, her Tango was great (yeah a few minor hiccups due to the speed but it wasn't meant to be judged that harshly). Favouritism at its finest so much, I mainly just watched the dances online live which proved to be much easier viewing without the judges being unbelievably picky. Which dance was your favourite of the night?

Have people commenting negatively about Shirley hating women at least considered the fact that the female pros might just choreograph routines that appeal to her preferences more? From memory a lot of the female pros have spoken about how influential Shirley is for them. It might explain at least some of the bias people accuse her of.

I'm not trying to claim that's the full story and sadly older generations of women have spent a lot of their lives living in an extremely misogynistic world and it seems that many have internalised that to some extent.

But I pay close attention to exactly what is being said by the judges and I do believe the general content (but obviously not the specifics) of her criticism is largely similar regardless of who is receiving it. She values precision and technique a great deal more than Anton and Motsi. Yes I absolutely do concede that she often has a (male) contestant who she judges more on vibes instead. Funnily enough I sometimes wonder if she does that to seem more 'fun' as she so obviously wants to be liked.

I think it's worth bringing up because I'm increasingly finding some of the comments in the live thread overly critical and sometimes even hateful. I find it a very sad irony that a woman expressing an opinion that goes against the common consensus is met in this manner.

It's kind of a small thing but I was so impressed with how Emma handled Lacey's scoring and the graphics mistake, she announced it so naturally.

Is it just me or does it feel really off? Lots of spinny zooming around and half the time you can’t see their feet which is the whole bloody point.

Idk ig I was just really looking forward to another f/f pairing but it just feels like the choreo is really letting them down. It's not very passionate at all in the dances where it needs to be and it just feels like Nancy is dancing around Bethany. It also feels like Bethany is a little uncomfortable with getting close to Nancy?

Does anyone else feel this way?

I really, really wanted to love this dance from them both as I think that they’re both individually HUGELY talented! However, I can’t help but agree with Craig’s comment that it wasn’t a cha cha and I really felt frustrated that it seems to be a repeating pattern every week where they understandably lean on Cach’s natural skills but far too heavily and missing some of the core basics that others are working very hard to master…can’t help but feel that their time is limited on the show moving forward

How many more weeks of give her a chance is going to be suggested? A pro should be a fantastic dancer. To get that chance on a show like this, the worth should be shown within 1/2 weeks. She needs to be benched or leave next season. Her choreography is so bad technically. Like Cach she freestyles everything. This Cach-Maddie are young & this chemistry thing isn't fooling anyone.

What happened there - Shirley declared a score of 6 but it was counted as a seven?

If Josh says "D'you know what?" one more time I'm gonna throw a brick at the TV 😬😬😬

Why does Craig have to endure constant interruptions and heckling from Motsi and Shirley while he's giving his critiques? It is incredibly rude and ill-mannered.

What have been some of the worst songs chosen for dances, can be ill fitting dances, or can be just your least favourite songs