Anton Du Bele has come under fire from Strictly Come Dancing, who declared they were left 'bemused' and unimpressed by his decision in the latest dance-off, as Kym Marsh became the latest star to leave the show.
A permanent judge for the second series of Strictly in a row, Anton was on the panel for this week's quarter final, which was moved from Saturday to Friday by the BBC. The theme was Musicals Week as the remaining six couples performed routines to tracks from everything from Miss Saigon to The Lion King.
A week after being struck down by Covid and being given a 'free pass' to the quarters, Kym Marsh fell into the dance-off for a second time, as she and Graziano Di Prima's cha cha cha to Fame saw them finish bottom of the leaderboard. There was another ballroom blow for young CBBC star Molly Rainford as she and pro partner Carlos Gu landed in the bottom two for a fourth time.
Molly was up first in the dance-off, as she and Carlos reprised their Charleston to Hot Honey Rag from Chicago. The dance scored 38 out of 40 on Friday, while Kym and Graziano got 34 for their performance. This week's Strictly result looked like being a foregone conclusion after Craig Revel-Horwood and Motsi Mabuse both opted to save Molly and Carlos. However, Anton forced a twist in the tale as he went for Kym and Graziano, forcing head judge Shirley Ballas to use her casting vote.
Shirley voted to keep Molly and Carlos, thus sending Kym and Graziano home but, millions of fans at home were of the opinion the result should never have gone to a casting vote as Molly was the 'better dancer by far.'
Taking aim at Anton for picking Kym, one unimpressed viewer took to Twitter to vent: "WTF is Anton on, saving kym???" A second reacted: "is anton genuinely okay?? kym was good but molly was 100x better" Taking their frustration further, another critic fumed: "What the hell was Anton thinking, I’d vote him off, right off that judges panel for that bloody decision to save Kym over Molly, thankfully the other judges had better sense."
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