Strictly returns this week as we reveal the show’s all-time greatest couples – according to the judges.

When the ever-popular BBC show returns this weekend celebrities including singer Toyah Wilcox, TV handyman Nick Knowles, and former X Factor winner Shayne Ward will find out the name of the professional dancer they will be partnered with.

The couples will then be dancing for the prestigious Glitterball Trophy, last won by Ellie Leach and her professional partner Vito Coppola in 2023. But famously, the voting public rarely agrees with the judges about which couple were the most impressive dancers – or who most deserved to be booted out of the competition. This has thrown up a number of surprise winners over the years.

Based on average scores doled out by the judges last year, Ellie and Vito would have finished second and the Giltterball would have instead gone to runners-up Layton Williams and Nikita Kuzmin. The 2022 champions, Hamza Yassin & Jowita Przystał, were only ranked third based purely on the judges average scores.

Now we can reveal that the couple who have most impressed the judges over 21 seasons of Strictly Come Dancing and more than 2,000 dances are… Ashley Roberts and Pasha Kovalev. They were beaten to the Glitter Ball by Stacey Dooley and Kevin Clifton despite being consistently scored higher by judges Craig Revel Horwood, Darcey Bussell, Shirley Ballas, and Bruno Tonioli.

The Strictly judges’ all-time leaderboard has been revealed

2018 pairing Ashley Roberts and Pasha Kovalev are the winners ( 
Image:
PA)
Over 16 dances, ex-Pussycat Doll Ashley and professional Pasha scored an impressive average of 9.23 points from each judge per dance – while Stacey and Kevin had an average of 8.50. The couple with the next all-time highest average score is ex-Coronation Street actor Natalie Gumede and her partner Artem Chigvintsev – runners up to Abbey Clancy and Aljaž Škorjanec in season 11 – with an average score of 9.22.

Last year’s runners-up Layton and Nikita round out the top three with an average score of 9.19. Of the top 10 highest-scoring couples only two won the Glitterball, Alesha Dixon and Matthew Cutler (9.13) and Kelvin Fletcher and Oti Mabuse (9.11). The lowest-scoring Strictly champions are Chris Hollins and Ola Jordan, who lifted the Glitter Ball at the end of season seven with an average score of 7.74. That’s only enough for a judges ranking of 89 out of nearly 300 couples to have competed on Strictly so far.

But the lowest-scoring couple in Strictly history are Quentin Wilson and professional Hazel Newberry. Quentin was dubbed “Britain’s worst dancer” for his Cha Cha Cha, which received just eight points overall from the judges, the lowest-ever score for a single dance. Unsurprisingly, he did not get to dance on the Strictly stage again and left the show with an average of just 2.00 points per judge per dance.

Strictly Come Dancing returns on Saturday, with a launch show hosted in the famous ballroom by Tess Daly and Claudia Winkleman.