The Voice continues, with the dreams of half the hopefuls dashed upon the mix decks of their coaches and mentors.

Over the last two weekends, coaches Tom, Ricky, Will and Rita paired up their charges and then cut them down. As we’ve seen in the past, it quite often turned into a screech off, with those brave enough – and confident enough in their ability  – to keep it under control faring better.

Standouts for me were Stevie, who oozed class, and Emmanuel, who gave a soft-pop-rock track a soulful undertone,  merging into angelic gospel, paired as he was with Classical Reflection. A shame they had to go out, it would have been lovely to hear them all do something together again.

Next week comes the Knockouts, when each team will lose five members. it’s brutal and also risky, as a coach could quite easily send home someone who’s the viewers favourite.

The teams as they now stand can be found on the BBC The Voice website.

My team lost three of its members and now looks like this: Lara, Sharon, Daniel and Karl (Tom) Claudia, Emmanuel and Stevie (Ricky) Hannah and Mitch (Rita).

The Knockouts take place over two nights on BBC 1 at the weekend: Saturday 7.15pm, and Sunday at 7.45pm.