Jodi & Michele Make Louis' Final 30...

First there were a thousand. Then there were one hundred. Then fifty. Now thirty... Soon, only five... Louis Walsh & Kian Egan have eliminated all of the dead wood and will soon have the world's next big girlband ready for business. It's bootcamp baby.

Jodi Albert, Michele McGrath

As we predicted eons ago, Jodi Albert and Michele McGrath have made it into Louis Walsh's final pick of lovelies for his and Kian Egan's girlband. They've now whittled the selection down to a mere thirty talented girls...

Kian Egan, Jodi Albert

As Kian Egan and his fiancée Jodi Albert turned-up together at The POD on Sunday for the final round of callbacks for this much publicized girlband project - it all seemed like a foregone conclusion that his girlfriend would make the band. Put money on it.

Michele McGrath

Over the course of the long and stressful day, the wannabes got cut from 100 to 50. Then, from 50 to 30. And yes there were tears and tantrums as the cut-throat business of axing the talent went on...

Jodi Albert

But as the numbers got smaller, the job got harder. Louis Walsh and his protégé Kian Egan were left with the choir of trimming the finalists down from 30 to 5 lucky ladies. But it wasn't to be. They just couldn't do it.

Linzi Cowap

Louis admitted that he's never witnessed such an abundance of good looks and great voices at an open audition. As a result they held on to the final 30 girls and intend to whisk them away to a secret location for a military styled girlband bootcamp. Can we come too?

Kasey Smith

Of course, our original prediction that Jodi Albert and Michele McGrath would make the final five, reigned true. Both Jodi and Michele are off to the babe bootcamp, so don't be surprised if they make the final line-up. We're going to stick our necks out here again and predict that Linzi Cowap will also be in the band - she's known Louis for quite a while. Perhaps 3 of the 5 places up for grabs were predestined?

Leanne Moore

Over the past few days we've had emails, web posts, texts and phone calls from hopefuls complaining that they weren't given enough of an opportunity to shine at the auditions - rushed in and out. Many feel as if Louis was already aware of the people he wanted for his band and the auditions were just a PR stunt...

Sharon Condon

Well, on those claims we sorta agree. This is spin-doctor Louis Walsh after all... The open auditions were a publicity mechanism for the band, but hey, that's commonplace these days. And we reckon Louis was already aware of at least three girls, if not four, that will get places in the band. How long he's been aware is another story...

Karena Graham, Tara O'Farrell

What we do know is that everyone involved in the auditions was shocked by the dept of talent available in Ireland. And, there's no way Louis would turn his nose up to an undiscovered star if she was to cross his path. No matter how safe other band members feel their place is, there's always the potential to elbow one of them out.

Jodi Albert, Michele McGrath

Before we left the auditions on Sunday, we spotted Jodi Albert and Michele McGrath deep in discussion. We asked them to pose for a picture, but Jodi flatly refused. Eh, so we took the shot anyway... Cheer up girls - you know your positions are as safe as glass houses.