The Strictly Spoiler - The home of the Strictly Spoiler

27th July 202027th July 2020

Welcome Back Facebook (plus news/info for Twitter too)

Ok first of all I have to welcome all the people on Facebook back to being able to access this site through Facebook. It’s been a long 9 months or so since Facebook blocked links to the site because it apparently breached their community standards (it didn’t) but we seem to be back up and running! Especially if you saw a link to this post on Facebook

I wanted to take the next few minutes to run through some stuff I’ve already mentioned to the people on Twitter but the people on Facebook may have missed. Twitter peeps don’t worry there may be new information for you as I’m going to go into a bit more detail.

The first thing I want to talk about are my plans for how I will source the spoiler depending on a number of scenarios. At the moment we know that Strictly will go ahead with a shorter than normal series. Also the Prime Minister announced the other week that audiences will be permitted in situations such as Strictly from October.

If Strictly goes ahead with an audience as it looks like it may be able to do so there shouldn’t be any change to the spoiler or how it is sourced and posted here. Though I will stress the importance that if you are part of the spoiler community and are lucky enough to get tickets please offer your services as a mole especially if the audience isn’t running at normal capacity as moles could be harder to come by this year!

However I also have a contingency plan for if there is no audience. Regular visitors to the website will know that I run polls every week. If there is no audience and therefore no moles my plan is to freeze the polls at a time when the the spoiler would normally be released and then plug the results of that poll into the scoring system in order to generate a result. I’ve done this with historic data for 2016 and 2017 and the results were promising with the elimination being correct a majority of the time.

I will not lie. This does not produce accurate results 100% of the time. But it does most of the time and given a choice between shutting up shop and giving up my job for a year or trying to get you guys a spoiler result even if that result is occasionally wrong there is no choice. Asking me to rest the spoiler for a year would be like asking any other employee to not work for a year and to do it with no pay. Not even furlough pay. I cannot do it! And it’s not like my self employment income support scheme grant will cover my bills as due to the years they use to assess it it isn’t anything close to the 80% of my income it is supposed to be but I’m getting political now so I’m going to move on.

I also mentioned the other week, but Facebook will have missed it, that I wouldn’t be able to run regular competitions this series and just wanted to expand a bit more on that decision and the reason behind it.

Every year for the last 5 years or so I’ve run some kind of a competition for all you guys getting involved in the discussions here and on social networks. Thousands of pounds worth of prizes have been paid out over the years with those prizes being paid for out of my income as a way to reward the people who help to make this site and the community what it is.

I am really sorry I will not be able to run a competition during the 2020 series and that’s going to be the case whether it happens socially distanced or happens normally. There’s just too many variables going on at the moment to allow me to accurately predict my income and budget for prizes. Advertisers have lower advertising budgets right now which means the income for many websites which depend on adverts is reduced and my income is down for this time of the year. I have no idea what it will be like when things start to pick up in a couple of months time.

Plus what I don’t want to do is promise and even award prizes only for my income to dry up and me not be able to pay them out. That would be a massive PR disaster and I’d rather say there won’t be any competitions and then maybe do the odd spot prize if my income and budget permits it rather than make promises I cannot keep.

The majority of you have been understanding of this decision and it is much appreciated. The competitions after all are a bonus. The majority of you are here for the spoiler!

One final thing I want to discuss is something that’s been a bit of a burning topic on Facebook and Twitter lately and that is the monetisation on this website and on my social networking channels. This year more than ever I am going to have to push the monetisation especially with the series being shorter and there being no Christmas Special so my income is already going to be down 33% and that’s assuming advertising pays the same as it did last year. Which it wont because advertising budgets are down as everyone is tightening their purses.

I also understand that those of you who would previously help me out directly with a financial donation to help towards my costs may not be able to do so this year as this pandemic has hit many people’s pockets hard!

One thing I will be pushing more and that’s been true the last few weeks on Facebook/Twitter are the energy switching links because they are a really good way to support me for free whilst earning yourself £50 and getting cheaper bills in the process. Please, please, please if you are based in the UK and are responsible for paying your energy bills just take two minutes out your time to check your prices using my link. Octopus energy have cheap green energy with 100% of their Electric coming from renewable sources.

If you have a smart meter and drive an electric car they have a fantastic tariff called Agile Octopus which has prices changing every 30 minutes allowing you to choose the best and cheapest time slot to run energy hungry appliances or charge your vehicle. I don’t have an electric car and I still save on average 40% compared to a regular electricity tariff just by doing things like running my washing machine and tumble dryer in cheaper time slots. Plus if there is surplus energy on the national grid on this tariff you can even get paid to use electricity!

Don’t worry if you don’t have a smart meter though as they offer normal tariffs too. Plus there is no lock-in and no early exit fee should you ever decide to leave them.

If you are lucky enough to be able to support me with a direct financial donation you can do so using THIS LINK or the button below to make a one off donation. In the current pandemic and with my income likely to be down significantly this year your donations are appreciated more than ever but please only make a direct financial donation if it wont cause you any hardship!

Or why not make a regular donation and get a warm fuzzy feeling by signing up to my patreon page. You can pledge various levels of support from £3 per month and if enough of you sign up I can start looking at exclusive patreon content!

While we are talking about monetisation if you guys have any ideas of the sort of things you’d like to see, perhaps something you’ve seen on other sites, let me know and I’ll look into implementing it here. You can get in touch in the comments or over on the social networks.

We should be just a matter of days away from the contestant announcements although there is a chance they will be delayed. Either way as soon as the BBC start to reveal them I will post them here at the home of the strictly spoiler too! Until then keep safe and keep dancing!

25th June 202025th June 2020

2020 Series Of Strictly Come Dancing To Be Shorter

The BBC announced last night that when the 2020 series of Strictly happens it will be a “slightly” shorter series than normal.

The BBC did not announce how much shorter the series would be and also did not announce whether this means the start of the series would be put back, the end of the series brought forwards or some kind of combination of the two. More information will be released by the BBC in due course.

With Kevin and AJ both leaving the pro line up it is possible (though this is speculation) that they would not be replaced and the series would be 2 weeks shorter to accommodate this. It is highly likely that attracting replacement pros in the current climate could prove to be difficult and this may be a factor in the decision to have a shorter series though it is also probably down to difficulties in maintain social distancing for participants over several weeks and a smaller cast will also aid with distancing in the studio.

While I’ve got you guys on the site I may as well update you guys on what will be happening with the spoiler this year. As you are aware the spoiler each week is leaked by a member of the studio audience to either myself or other groups I work with. With the current pandemic there is a possibility that Strictly may be done without an audience this series. No audience means no moles which means no spoiler. Right?

Well not necessarily. I’ve been looking into other ways to bring you a spoiler and am currently looking at making use of my polling data from the weekly polls I run to bring you a result. I’ve tested this with the historic data from 2016 and 2017 and whilst a margin for error does exist the results were right or at least had the elimination right the vast majority of the time.

I polled you guys on Twitter and you were pretty split but a majority of you would prefer to get a spoiler that may be wrong some of the time rather than no spoiler. In all honesty I can’t just shut up shop for a year if there isn’t a studio audience because this is my job and no one in their right mind would not work for a year and receive no income if there was an alternative. This pandemic has affected countless businesses and even as the lockdown eases we won’t be back to normal for a long time. My business is no different and has to move with the times.

I’ve also had to take what is a very difficult decision and have to say that I cannot run any form of regular competition on this website or my social networking channels during the 2020 series. This announcement that the series will be shorter has compounded that decision as I’m now guaranteed to be losing a few weeks of income this year and the prizes each series are paid for out of my own income. Not to mention that income comes mainly from advertising and advertisers pockets are a lot shallower this year so there is likely to be a hit on my income anyway.

This isn’t to say there will be zero competitions. I run competitions as a way of rewarding the more active members of the community who join in with the discussions but I would rather say there won’t be any competitions and then run the occasional surprise one if my income will allow it than promise regular weekly prizes only to have to pull the competitions because I can’t afford to pay out the prizes. Hopefully you guys can understand this decision.

I won’t lie however and due to my income likely being reduced I think donations will be a rather big necessity to keep this site up at peak times whether we have a normal spoiler from audience moles or we have one calculated from my polls. I understand that many people are in similar or maybe even worse situations than I am because of this pandemic and not everyone will be able to help me out but I will be eternally grateful to anyone who can either make a one off donation or a regular one. You can use THIS LINK or the button below to make a one off donation.

Or you can set up a regular donation to help support me every month using the button below. You can choose to donate any amount from £5 a month. You are free to cancel your regular donations at any time but will be automatically charged your selected amount every month if you donate using the button below. If you’d rather make a one time donation you should use the PayPal link/button above!

Set up a regular monthly donation

If you can’t make a donation then please, please, please take two minutes out of your time to check your energy prices. If you switch to green energy with 100% renewable electricity from Octopus Energy using my link not only could you save £100s on your energy prices but you get £50, I get £50, everyone wins and it will help me out massively!

I know it’s been pretty quiet around here during the last few months not helped by the off season combined with the pandemic but things should start getting busier again now with more content especially as more details about what the 2020 series of Strictly will look like emerge and we also learn who will be participating which should start in a few weeks. In the meantime I hope you have all been keeping well and safe during the pandemic

17th February 202029th March 2020

Caroline Flack – A Tribute

No doubt, unless you’ve been living in a cave somewhere, you will have all have heard that sadly former Strictly Champion Caroline Flack died at the weekend. In this post I’ll be taking a look at her journey to becoming Strictly Champion during the memorable 2014 series when she was partnered with Pasha.

The format of this post will be similar to my finalist previews at least at first. So we begin with

Worst Dance

It’s kind of funny to call something her worst dance give she was a strong participant throughout the 2014 series. Lowest scoring dance might be more appropriate and as we’ll see in her best dances she actually got the chance to improve on this dance.

Anyway her lowest scoring dance was her Cha Cha Cha from Week 1 which opened the 2014 series and scored a still very respectable 27 points (6,7,7,7)

Best Dances

Caroline and Pasha had all four judges reaching for their 10 paddles on 4 occasions during the 2014 series. Once in the semi final and three times in the final becoming the first couple in Strictly history to have a perfect 3 dances in the final and the first couple to score 40 across four consecutive dances.

Their semi final routine was a Salsa to Maria by Ricky Martin

In the final they performed the above Cha Cha Cha from week 1 improving it to the point that all four judges scored it a perfect score

They also re-performed their Charleston from Around The World Week in Week 10 which previously had just Craig denying it a perfect score. However Craig brushed off the cobwebs on his 10 paddle in the final to give it that extra point

It’s their show dance that is probably going to be remembered now especially in the context of the recent tragedy. An emotional piece performed to “Angels” by Robbie Williams and it’s hard for the routine not to take on new meaning now she is with the Angels and it’s hard to watch the routine without a tear in your eye. I was welling up watching it while I was getting this piece ready believe me. Oh it scored a perfect 40 too but you guys knew that.

Honourable Mentions

A couple of honourable mentions from Caroline’s Strictly experience. Firstly her Argentine Tango which in week 11 wowed all the judges apart from Craig who gave it a 9

Finally we’re going back to Movie Week in Week 3 when they did a Rumba to Aerosmith’s “I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing”. It was a good performance, especially as Rumba can be hard for a celeb, and given the emotion she brought to her later routines I wonder what they could have done with it if it had been brought back for the final. Discounting Donny Osmond it scored 33, including him it scored 42 (8,8,(9),8,9)

Number Of Times In The Dance Off

It’s been a rarity for the last couple of series for a finalist, or indeed a champion, to find themselves in the Dance Off but it actually happened for Caroline and Pasha.

In week 7 their Waltz saw them languishing in the bottom two but they were more than good enough to see off Alison and Aljaž

Winning Moment

And here is the moment they were announced champions in 2014

At this point I was going to add a few words of my own but I don’t think there is anything I could say that would be better than the emotional tribute that close friend of Caroline’s Laura Whitmore said on BBC Radio yesterday.

Normally it’s at this point in a post that you’d see a ton of monetisation as I ask you to help out with my hosting costs, or switch energy supplier or one of the many other things that allows me to cover the costs of providing this site and also provide an income for myself. I’m not going to do that today on this post! There’s something much more important

Since about 9am yesterday morning I’ve been running a fundraising campaign on Facebook to try and raise money for The Samaritans. I’m sure I don’t need to say too much about The Samaritans and the work they do both for people who might find themselves in crisis and struggling to go on like Caroline did and for people who have more minor problems but still need a friendly person to talk to.

At the time of writing this post the fundraiser has made £884 in about 24 hours. The initial target of £400 got smashed in a couple of hours. Caroline’s tragic death has resonated with so many of you and so many of you have helped out for a cause dedicated to always having someone there you can turn to if you ever find yourself in a situation like Caroline did.

If you are willing to, can afford to and have Facebook as it is being done through Facebook’s donations system so all the money goes to the charity you can visit my fundraiser right here and give as much or as little as you like and can afford. If you don’t have Facebook but still want to get involved get in touch with me in the comments below (only visible on individual posts) or over on Twitter and I’ll sort out another means you can donate

With that all that’s left for me to say is RIP Caroline Flack 1979-2020