If no sing off then sub 1.5 Mary backers would have been barking.

BAAA.

i lost alot of money tonight, backing mary on the pretext it would br bottom out. so obviously i am totally fuming that cowell orchestrated a sing off to save cher. of course she was bottom. and shame on danni for falling into line.

but did dermot ever say 100 per cent that it was lowest votes only? or was it just us assuming it because of previous years etc etcv

I'm being thick but how did you lose Nick if you backed mary to be bottom..you mean cher?

Dizzy disagree re value. It said on itv website bottom was out no mention of sing off. On that basis cher was good value. Once sing off announced then some options re damage limitations for cher backers I guess.

Dermot didn't say - it was notable by its absence last night.  Certainly raised my suspicions, although I did suspect that the sing off could well be a possibility, regardless of what Louis had said on Irish Radio.

To be honest Nick, it was a week that we shouldn't really have played the elimination market.  I got lucky backing Mary early doors on Monday morning due to having an op last week, blissfully ignorant that it was supposed to be lowest vote goes.

I had always assumed that with five contestants left it would be a sing off - but I can understand people feeling aggrieved if there were official announcements to the contrary.

she's changed the sheets and sprayed the room with febreeze

sounds like you're talking from experience

your humour is unsurprisingly poor too

now I know what sort of people watch Miranda, prat.

win some lose some george, well done anyway

Rebecca in a clear lead on twitter now.

dont worry about pmbets george - he is lay professional just trying to ramp his bet, so so boring, spends all day on here telling us how great rebecca is. must have a fair bit invested

agreed re middle england, cher cant win, can one d win if cher goes out first, which she will?

hope (and think) you're right dizzy, and hope the one d vote isnt buoyed too much by a take that duet....

I think it could be pretty close between the three. Plenty of support for 1D from the younger yummie mummies I think as well as from the teens. 1D have maged to do what the girl groups on here who get voted out early doors every year fail to do i.e. established individual personalities. So each teen/mum has ther favourite so connect is there even more so than JLS in my view..and they came second.

Cher going out first will benefit them as well I think.

Rebecca likely to get a lot of Mary's vote and she will have a broad vote base.

Matt still ahead for me and has a juggernaut feel as his poor performance yesterday didn't dent his support. That said it's game on now I suspect and a lot will depend on the night and who cowell pimps. Can't see it being matt somehow.

ironically pmbets may have something re twitter. Lots more support for rebecca now "for the win".

I'm very pleased that last night's fix has caused such a storm, hundreds of complaints and The Sun highlighting it. It means he's not likely now to fiddle the votes in the final to get a 1D win. I don't think there was a great chance of that anyway, and I'm not sure that's even what he wants anyway. But there was some chance (vote fiddling was how Girls Aloud was formed).

He's got the 4 he wants to sign up in the final, the finishing order isn't terribly important to him, the public might actually be allowed to decide.

Nevertheless I do think they would like a group to win for once, especially a manufactured one as it's good for their collective egos

True, but that has to be weighed against the fact that this particular group isn't very good and wouldn't make good ambassadors (except to a mime convention).

Figgy's Twitter stats, YouGov/ICM polls on a chart.

Twitter's useful for momentum, it pointed to a lay of 1D and Rebecca for yesterday's elimination.

ID always poll a lot worse than twitter suggests (and Mary polled better, in line with the age bias).

http://www.flickr.com/photos/44621682@N06/5237651838/

Agree with that aa, the difficult question now is - who's the better value - Matt 1.92 or Rebecca 5.3?

Henry

I see what you're saying about the value on Rebecca against Matt's odds but surmising they are the final two (who knows) then would you rather back a 1.92 winner or a 'nice price' 5.3 Rebecca who finishes second?  I know we don't kow he's going to win but as aa matt is far more likely to knock one out of the park in the final. as he has about three or four times already whereas Rebecca hasn't wowed us once.  He's not a certainty of course not but I do really think he's the winner full stop.

The momentum is mostly with Rebecca now, and to a smaller extent 1D

Matt done well in the early weeks but did he peak too soon?

Danyl got 36% of the votes in 1 week eliminated the next, so I dont think Xfactor fans are as loyal as some might imagine.

If his voice is still a little dodgy next week and he sings " first time" again, will it have the same impact? will people judge it against his first effort and not vote ?

Rebecca is by far the nicest personality in there, if people are undecided who the best singer is they will pick the phone up for her imo

I guess we'll have another YouGov poll this week which will probably confirm it's a 2 horse race.
It will be interesting to see how the market reacts to it.
It didn't cause much of a ripple last year iirc.

Actually their semi-final poll only had 3% difference between Olly and Stacey. This should be different, but as you say the market's reaction will be interesting.

"I've never bought this argument about the value bet.  A bet is only value if it wins."

Sorry fella, but that's nonsense.

RMB

Yes I know what you mean.  She hit about 2/1 about 4 weeks ago but has gone backwards since then.  Of the three obvious finalists she's the outsider.  That said though I'd definately rather back her than One D though specially at those odds.

I totally agree that Matt peaked too soon - but have the others shown enough to make a fight of it in the final furlong?

Rebecca had her chance but flattered to deceive and appears to be just a one paced stayer, while One Direction is the flashy juvenile - all style, no substance and will find little off the bridle.

Matt seems to be the pure thoroughbred in the competition, although my guess is that they will still try to frame the final (through song choices, duets etc.) to make it a close run thing.

Oh, almost forgot to mention Cher - she's the donkey parading on Brighton Beach!