BBC Strictly Come Dancing pro slams fans as they address Nigel Harman backlash

Strictly Come Dancing alumni Vincent Simone said viewers who believe Nigel Harman has been marked too harshly during this year’s competition are wrong.

The 44 year old professional dancer, who appeared on the hit BBC show from 2006 to 2012, believes the judges have treated the former EastEnders actor, 50, and his partner Katya Jones fairly so far this season. It comes after fans of the show complained that Nigel had been consistently undermarked on Strictly – including last weekend’s Rumba and the previous week’s Quickstep.

Some viewers said the actor was being “stitched up” and that the situation was getting to be “beyond a joke”.

But in an interview with ICE36, Vincent said: “I am sorry Strictly fans, but I have to disagree with you. I think Nigel has been marked fairly throughout the competition.

“The Rumba is a really hard dance – I know the judges have said that a million times – for a male celebrity. The fact that he went out there and tried…I really, really enjoyed his dance.”

Vincent went on to say he thought Bobby Brazier’s emotional dance was the best of the night – followed by Nigel.

He added: “I really enjoyed Nigel’s Rumba; he really tried. Like Craig said, Nigel has beautiful arms.

“What did he score 33? I thought that was the right score. The dance wasn’t worthy of a ten, he could have maybe got a couple more points, but I think it was a pretty fair score

“I didn’t think it was too high or too low – that is the score I would have given Nigel.”

Nigel and Katya danced the Rumba to It's All Coming Back To Me Now by Celine Dion and received some good comments from the judges. Anton Du Beke called the performance "super duper" and Craig Revel Horwood said while he would have liked to have seen more “hip action”, Nigel’s arms were “absolutely gorgeous”.

But Nigel’s score of 33 points left many viewers feeling that other celebs had received more criticism but had still been marked higher.

Taking to X/Twitter, one viewer wrote: “So Layton gets criticised and scores 34, Nigel hardly gets any criticism but only scores 33? Make it make sense. Why do they ALWAYS under mark Nigel, it’s getting beyond a joke now.”

A second added: “Nigel's been stitched up again judges gave no mistakes but still undermarked. Hope audience vote saves him from dance off, was amazing tonight deserved higher spot & saving this week.”

In the end, it was Bad Education actor Layton Williams who found himself in the dance-off against TV presenter Angela Scanlon. And it was Angela who was eventually eliminated from the competition.

Meanwhile, the previous week, Nigel appeared to 'storm off' the dancefloor after the judges gave him feedback. The soap actor and his professional partner Katya Jones danced a Quickstep to the song It Don’t Mean A Thing If It Ain’t Got That Swing by Duke Ellington but were given a score of 31 out of 40 by the four judges – leaving them second bottom of the leaderboard.

A video posted to social media later showed Nigel leaving the dancefloor just seconds after the BBC cameras stopped filming leaving Katya, 34, confused.

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