She's a home carer so she will have elderly/vulnerable people relying on her. The 15 shows she's appeared on would have taken a week to record and that's probably the maximum time she could be spared for by her employers. And as she's also 'skint' I'm sure that she didn't want to lose another week's wages either.

Knew it was an OBW from a Deal when I saw Mark had the last post: knew it was an ugly one when I saw so many posts at 5:15pm.

On no other show can a £26,000 win for a contestant with financial difficulties be presented as a miserable failure.

And when you consider that desperate financial situation was bought upon by decisions made in the cognitive fog of mental illness, and the ending was left as an endorsement of rash financial decisions and with a distinct taste of mocking an inability to act on an irrational hunch, when acting upon irrational hunches (to spend money in the grip of depression) was such a big reason for her to be in no position to reject such a large offer even with a strong and stable board.

To be honest, and speaking as someone who has battled with suicidal impulses and probably undiagnosed depression for years, I am pretty horrified at this game. And of all the times for it to air...

Well, as I said, Noel did not help one little bit by playing around with that fourth offer, and nor did the mother by saying "think about winning 1p".

I'm going to speculate once again...

Had neither of these things happened, it's not beyond possibility that Toni would have gone on.

Of course, in that case, the offer at 5-box probably wouldn't have been £33k - more likely a stick at the Governor.

There'd have probably been more pressure on her to deal, though - particularly from the mother...

And it's likely that she would have still been in a state at leaving the second-best finish.




Cheers for that explanation Chelsea.

So once again, it's interfering relatives!

This forum is seriously winding me up. All the glory-hunters can afford to gamble money that's not theirs can't they?

If you were suffering from severe depression/poverty how you you like people laughing at you???

Actually KP has said what I wanted to far better - it's just I don't get to see the show "live" these days so often reading this description is my first knowledge of what has happened, so having read the description and understood what situation Toni was in, my initial reaction of a lot of the posts was just pure anger.

I think someone totally at ease with whatever decision they made wouldn't react like her at that particular decision going wrong (even some people who dealt too early have said words to the effect of "I'm happy with what I got, despite subsequent events say be hindsight it was wrong") and not appeared too bothered. But someone vulnerable like her was always going to react badly to things going wrong - but I guarantee in her situation, losing £26k and winning a blue would have been FAR worse than what actually happened.

On playing just 15 shows, I completely agree with Chelsea. For some players it must be difficult to balance the huge opportunity to play the game versus the amount of time off allowed by the employer. Plus being a carer she would have been needed back.

Clearly her relative played a large part in her decision, but her presence would have been necessary to ground Toni as money has played such an important part in her life and led to her current financial situation.

I hope that after the game and once the emotion had settled down, Toni came to terms with what £26,000, which is a huge amount, would do for her life. I hope it did provide the base from which Toni could rebuild as Noel talked about during the game.

To be honest with you, i'm almost embarrassed to be living 10 miles from her after that performance. She dealt, yes but she still had a decent win. Silly girl

Let's put things into perspective. Had she not kept any box other than the £250k to the end, it wouldn't have been anywhere near as painful.

And just for the record - the longest runner had £50 today.

I actually knew the outcome of the game today because it got posted on my Twitter feed by a non-DOND related person.

Today is actually one of the games on this forum that makes me wish that actually watching a show live was a pre-requisite for being allowed to post on here (impractical I know but if I ever won the Lottery, I would pay for people to go to Bristol and watch the show)

I wouldn't be able to post then Simon!

Seen the full thing on 4OD now. Honestly this is the sort of player I can feel empathy with rather than the poker face type or the ones who feel they just have to open their box whatever like Joycey for example. I seriously feel that if all this forum is about is shooting down players like Toni then quite frankly I'm questioning whether I want to be part of it becuase I think it's ridiculous.

In all honesty I'm been worried about my job security for a while now, so I think if I went on there and was offered enough for relative security for a long period, I think I'd grab it with both hands if there was still a chance I could win nothing, and I'm not afraid to admit it.

Two things I did really like: Toni telling the banker off for laughing at her (I'd have grabbed the phone off Nole and called him a c**t or something though!), and also Noel recognising that the £250k was there to be hit on the wings, and there's no way she'd have been offered £26k (even with the £75k on the table), and not rubbing it in by wanting her to do a hypo-swap (which i feared becuase the theory that she though she had the £75k would mean by that logic she should swap)!!!



Rant over.

As someone who reads this every day, even though I don't contribute, I knew straight away we'd be getting a "OH DEAR OH DEAR SHOULDA BEEN A LOT MORE BRAVE!!!". Which seems to be the default hotkey response to anyone who doesn't go all the way and win big. Amazingly enough the games aren't played with the benefit of hindsight. The potential to burn the game on a theory, or get a couple of years wages makes taking real money right now, makes dealing an easy decision to take.

Sorry but again I don't buy the sob story aspect to why Team banker should feel any pity to someone walking away with £26,000! She came on wailing like a banshee and was praising the lord and yelping until the point she dealt and then started regretting it. In fact she made a conscious decision when she said deal with a grin on her face - compare that to Donnas deal moment. It was identical.

A lot of people are in far worse situations, with more debt and get on with it. As to winning £26,000 and then crying like a baby I've seen enough of those endings to write a book. Blame Noel for the fake offer trick and her mum for driving her.

The only negative point would be a lack of hypo swap. Given it would have been offered in live play and especially as she claimed £75k was in her box! That would have sweetened it even more for the 'nasty' team. Bring on more of those finishes and keep the hate coming! Endemol must have loved the ratings for this show. Neither side can say this is a game that will be forgotton in a while.

Well thats at least something we agree on! I thought a lot of this game was playing on with honesty and I feel that sugar coated endings dipped with tears don't do anything for the legions of players who have gone home with a peanuts amount of money.

That would be fair enough but you've also criticised and laughed at players who've pushed their luck too far and won a blue. So by that sense what the hell do people have to do for you to approve?

And I've accepted that I've been wrong many times and regularly criticise Noel and the production team. I don't always play on the side of the banker but something about the whining and crying really get me as worked up.

If in proveout she had taken the £75k and £250k out you can bet she would have screamed the place down and everyone would have been backslapping each other. Plenty of people who have won blue have accepted it on the chin and got on with life.

Posts by James, KP and RMF1254 pretty much sum up my feelings.

The reason Noel didn't do the hypo-swap was probably because he wanted it all to be over by that point, that Toni (and perhaps the viewers!) had suffered enough, and the result would be a banker win whichever of the two amounts was on the table (unlike say Rob's where a small victory was still possible). Plus it meant Toni was actually able to put things into perspective sooner rather than later and realise what she could do with £26k, which many of the haters laughing at her misfortune were initially criticising her for not doing.

Fair enough. I just don't think that I "get" your approach to the game, you're right a lot of people who have won blues and not had much control over it would have given all sorts to have been in Toni's position even if they did miss out on a lot more. ( I thought that about Sarah who played a couple of days after Donna but she did have chances to deal though).

The players I tend to dislikeare the bolshy ones claiming they're going to win the £250k and all sorts and usually end up winning blues and looking like an idiot (1p Matty). Players like Toni who wear their hearts on their sleeves tend to be my favourites (as I feel like I'm a bit like that myself) although I always worry about it going seriously wrong for them!

Okay well it seems its me against everyone else, but thats ok! Id rather see the game played with honesty regardless of the outcome giving a hypothetical win to the Banker or the player.

If she had swapped it certainly wouldnt have been the lowest deal amount for the £250k. Ironic that you mentioned Rob there.

Woo, what a game. Will live long in the memory and certainly divided those of us on the forum.

I was somewhat surprised to get all the tears from the outset - she seemed so confidant the other day when she took charge. I suppose it's a totally different thing when it's your game, and she probably wasn't expecting it to be her game. I know she hasn't made the best decisions in the past about money - I just hope she takes time to think about how lucky she's been to win 26k. I'd find that pretty life-changing and I'm in a hell of lot better financial situation than she is (and remember poor old Claudio who never had a chance at that kind of money through no fault of his own).

So it won't come as much of a surprise that I'm with KP and James1978 on this one. There's a lot of people in the casino and betting industry who earn better money than Toni on the sort of people who 'know' they have 75k in one special box of 8.