Last night I watched the final-before-the-finale episode of Australia's Next Top Model, in which creepy Midwich Cuckoo cyborg Clare was sent packing along with her chin (which left the elimination hall a good three minutes before the rest of her), leaving Cassi and Tahnee as the final two who'll battle it out, live, next week in order to decide who will be Australia's next top reality-TV-born model, and who'll be its next top Muffin Break employee.

It's hard to believe we've come to the end of another Top Model journey; it feels like only yesterday that Cassi was punching walls and threatening to drag Clare out of the shower by her friggin' hair - now she's blossomed into a thoughtful and professional young woman and, as guest judge Doll Wright noted, an "international" model. To illustrate that point visually:

Old Cassi:


New Cassi:


Our little girl is all growed up!

Even Helen Keller could tell that the Sunbury bogan babe is in it to win it. In short, if Cassi doesn't end up the victor come next Tuesday night's live finale, my head will literally do this:



But at this stage, although my post may not have given you much sense of it, there are two girls left in the competition, and Tahnee is one of them.

Look, Tahnee is a lovely looking girl - she has what the media likes to term a "healthy figure" (this means she looks athletic and curvy, but can probably actually be fit inside a box of matches) and a pretty smile, lovely hair (albeit stuffed with extensions from the Dramatic Makeover Episode) and... well, that's about it, really, isn't it?

My main problem with Tahnee is that she has no discernible personality. At first I thought she might have been a hey-duuuude/let's hang out chick like my beloved, long lost Madison, but then I realised she's just blank. Which I guess, in model terms, is quite handy, but LOOK: she makes the same face (the "I'm just about to say 'prune'" pout) in EVERY SINGLE PHOTO.



(Why, yes, I do have a lot of time on my hands.)

How have the judges not picked up on this? I've lost count of the number of times through various incarnations and cycles of Top Model that judges have bemoaned "fly catcher mouths" and "fish faces" - WHY IS TAHNEE GETTING OFF SCOTT FREE?

And - though this will make me wildly unpopular - Tahnee won't get high fashion work if she does win; she didn't fit many of the clothes in Episode 10's Fashion Week challenge, and let's face it, when was the last time her look went gangbusters? Sarah Murdoch may enthusiastically describe her as "Sports Illustrated, Victoria's Secret", but posing in your scanties on a beach does not a top model make. (Sorry, Sarah.)

I fear we could be in for a repeat of Cycle 1 (Gemma) or Cycle 4 (Demelza) here, in which the better model is trumped by some sort of do-good spirit on the part of the judges, who want to be seen to be supporting healthy looks and decent temperaments rather than kick-arse modelling skills (except, hang on, Demelza was a complete psychopath).

Cassi is a leggy stunner and a totally amazing model - who cares what she's like off the set? The majority of actual top models working in the fashion industry are teenagers, so the wider media's "but she's too young/too aggro/can't handle it" arguments don't wash.

And unlike fellow "bogan" and Cycle 2 winner Eboni (who I maintain was AMAZING), Cassi actually wants to model. She's not going to win and then go back to packing mad bowls with her boyfriend and listening to Tha Dogg Pound compilations. As she noted in last night's elimination, she needs to win it.

Sure, she doesn't have the grace and ease that Tahnee seems to on the catwalk, but there's something about Cassi's juddery foal walk that is somehow more captivating, anyway.

Plus, LOOK AT CASSI'S BABY PHOTO:



I rest my case. Well, I don't, but you get the idea. CASSI CASSI CASSI!!

So, fellow ANTM maniacs, who is your pick to win it?