The Apprentice: season 11, episode 9 recap: "Must Be Viewed to Be Appreciated"

This is it, folks; the long-awaited bust-up between Charleine and Selina happens in this very episode. But before we get to the mother of all showdowns, we have to endure Lord Sugar turning his bunch of wankers into even worse wankers.

The task

Atop a grey and blustery London skyscraper, Lord Sugar challenges the contestants to settle their differences à la Mortal Kombat. Actually, they're going to be estate agents, but wouldn't that be amazing? Selina could do a roundhouse kick to Charleine, knocking her to the ground before she pulls out her spine to the delight of the braying crowd, as Claude bellows, "FINISH HER!"

But of course they're going to be estate agents – the group of nitwits who almost killed a woman with a severe allergy because they couldn't work out that NUTella had nuts in it should definitely sell houses to people trying to get a foot on a precarious property ladder. Is this even legal?

Throwing their hard hats into the ring, Joseph and Rich pitch to be Project Managers. Lord Sugar in his infinite wisdom has decided to put Selina on the same team as Charleine, who immediately start to circle each other like scorpions over who's going to sell the high-end apartments. Unfortunately for us, Joseph decides to separate them; why isn't Karren stepping in now?

The ones looking after the high-end flats – Vana/Richard and Joseph/Selina – must pitch to two property developers in order to flog their floorplans. To both Karren's astonishment and mine, Vana manages to charm both developers, because "her parents were architects so she understands flow". Get this, my dad's a plumber so I understand flow as well. She and Richard win the right to sell for the places in Canary Wharf, because the business exec didn't appreciate Joe and Selina turning up with faces like two slapped bums; Selina's not doing much to distance herself from her moral vacuum label. His actual words are "Vana and Richard were more polished", so somehow you know Selina is going to make this Charleine's fault.

That means that the gruesome twosome are selling on behalf of Manhattan Loft Gardens in Stratford for a very passionate and lively French chap, who has taken a disliking to Joe's dapper braces and purple shirt, calling him "too corporate". So he decides to wear a white shirt instead, but still keep the Dick Dastardly moustache, which is most definitely not corporate.

Despite Charleine making a sale in the Lewisham mid-range apartments within minutes, Joseph won't let her join team High-End. As I predicted earlier just a paragraph ago, Selina manages to insinuate that Charleine and Gary wouldn't have been polished enough to get the Canary Wharf pitch either, leading to an argument over who is the more polished. Does this happen at Foxtons, I wonder?

In Clapham, Scott shows a potential buyer around a show flat in a converted printworks, demonstrating the key features: "These are obviously walls", and "There are windows to let the sun in, day and night." She doesn't buy it. It's not unfair to say that Scott is terrible at this task; showing another family around, he mentions the merits of how much people are enjoying "The Clapham" and that there's a local chip shop nearby. SOLD!

Across town in SE London, Gary tries to do the hard sell on Lewisham, pointing out that some people might like to look at the "greenery" just beyond the train tracks, "the city" just beyond the building sites or even just enjoy looking at "Lewisham" itself. No offence to Lewisham, but no.

Meanwhile in Canary Wharf, Vana and Richard are trying to sweeten a million pound deal with some jammie dodgers and fondant fancies bought from the Co-op. There's not actually any floorplans available, but somehow between Vana's hand-drawn explanation of "flow" and Mr Kipling's finest they are able to sell one of their high-end flats unseen to a guy who's rocked up in a white Rolls. If it's that easy to sell a house, I am in the wrong job – right after this I'm going on the Next website for some corporate threads (no braces) for an interview with Foxtons.

The boardroom

Sugar delivers a neat burn to Joseph, saying he looks like Super Mario, and he's a plumber, innit. After Richard admits he got the name of the sales company wrong during a sale, Sugar spits out another barb, telling him: "We don't go around calling you Dick. At least not to your face." I have a really hard time believing Lord Sugar comes up with these bon mots himself.

The whipping boy for Karren this week is Scott, as she gleefully points out he didn't know anything during the task, to which he points out why would he, because he's not an estate agent. Finally, someone gets it!

The numbers are in: Vana and Dick get a sky-high commission of £63k, earning their team a speedboat ride down the Thames. But SHOCK TWIST, Scott stays in his seat and tells Lord Sugar he wants to leave the process. His team-mates are shocked – does he not want to go on the speedboat? Is it because he knew he'd be in the firing line next week, or because he has realised, as we all have, this has got absolutely bollock-all to do with his business plan? Lord Sugar accepts his resignation, and a stormy faced Scott exits Amstrad HQ.

There's little time to deal with the fallout, however, as Charleine and Selina have started to lay into each other in front of the prawn sandwiches in the Sad Café. Yasssssss! They're both one Bacardi Breezer away from ripping each other's hair out, with Charleine still incensed at Selina's "polished" comment; has she not seen how much hairspray she uses?
Who got fired?

Joseph opts to bring Selina and Gary back into the boardroom; Charleine has to be told three times it's OK for her to go back to the house following her French exit last week.

Selina still tries to blame her lack of sales on everyone else, and that "polish-gate" was because of Super Mario and not her, but it's not a big surprise that, in the end, Sugar ejects her from the process.
Does she thank him?

She gives him a courteous nod.

Next week, the contestants must learn a completely new skill that's completely alien to them in two hours, and are then expected to be experts in that area the next day. Hang on a minute...