Strictly Come Dancing 2023: Who’s top of the the leaderboard after week seven?

How the judges marked the ‘Strictly’ couples at series' halfway mark

Strictly Come Dancing week seven saw the judges start scoring harsher as the series reached its midway mark, drastically shaking up the leaderboard.

The nine remaining couples performed a variety of dance routines, with Ellie Leach and Vito Coppola impressing the most (once again) with a near-perfect score of 39 points. According to Motsbi Mabuse, their American Smooth to “Ain’t That a Kick in the Head” gave off “finale vibes”.

Close behind them were Layton Williams and Nikita Kuzmin, with the highest-scoring Jive of this year’s series to date, as well as Annabel Croft and Johannes Radebe, whose Couple’s Choice was a moving tribute to the former tennis player’s husband, Mel, who died of cancer earlier this year.

Meanwhile, at the other end of the leaderboard were Angela Scanlon and Carlos Guy who, along with with Adam Thomas and Luba Mushtuk, received the joint lowest scores of the evening.

Find out who got eliminated in Sunday night’s results show here.

Here is this week’s leaderboard in full, with the individual marks from judges Craig Revel Horwood, Motsi Mabuse, Shirley Ballas and Anton Du Beke:

Ellie Leach and Vito Coppola: 9 + 10 + 10 + 10 = 39

Layton Williams and Nikita Kuzmin: 8 + 10 + 10 + 8 = 36

Annabel Croft and Johannes Radebe: 8 + 9 + 9 + 9 = 35

Nigel Harman and Katya Jones: 7 + 9 + 9 + 8 = 33

Bobby Brazier and Dianne Buswell: 6 + 8 + 8 + 8 = 30

Nikita Kuzmin and Layton Williams celebrate after receiving another high score (BBC)

Krishnan Guru-Murthy and Lauren Oakley: 6 + 8 + 8 + 7 = 29

Angela Rippon and Kai Widdrington: 7 + 8 + 6 + 7 = 28

Adam Thomas and Luba Mushtuk: 6 + 7 + 7 + 7 = 27

Angela Scanlon and Carlos Gu: 6 + 7 + 7 + 7 = 27

The Strictly results show will air on Sunday 5 November on BBC One.