Flash Entertainment

Complaints about X Factor being fixed have continued today following conflicting tabloid reports.

Simon Cowell has stepped into the dispute - caused by the introduction of a sing-off in last weekend's semi-final - assuring readers ofThe Sun newspaper that the show has "done nothing wrong".

The SyCo boss also insisted that he never knows "the exact placings of the artists" in the phone votes until the end of the series.

Speaking about the sing-off between Mary Byrne and Cher Lloyd, he added: "There has always been a sing-off when there are five people left in the competition. This is a lot of nonsense about nothing."

However, in an interview with The Mirror, eliminated Byrne has described the ITV1 talent show as "a fix".

"It's not the show the public think it is," she is quoted as saying. "I knew the public had voted for me to stay on, and I actually thought the result would be based just on their vote. It was only on Saturday I discovered that there would be a sing-off where the judges decided.

"It's obvious Simon didn't want me in the final and I get that. I'm not as marketable to him as Cher so he was never going to put me through. They fixed it for me to lose. It didn't matter what the public think."

ITV and Simon Cowell have insisted that the introduction of a sing-off in the semi-final was made "weeks ago".