But after speaking to Gerald, he revealed that he wasn’t surprised with the events that unfolded during Tribal Council and it all began at the KFC reward.
“When Dani told me she wanted to vote for Emmett, it was certainly something that I had thought about myself -- that going forward at some point in the near future we would need to target Emmett, being an extremely strong competitor in the game in the physical side of it,” Gerald told 10 play.
But little did Gerald know, Emmett would lose the next immunity challenge. And he felt that it was too soon to turn on his alliance, which he thought was a strong five.
“We had made the agreement at the KFC reward that when Emmett didn’t win the immunity challenge, that’s when we would vote him out. However, I didn’t think he would lose the very next one and I was hoping that we would have at least one more up our sleeve because, at the moment, I still had a strong alliance of five.”
Read More: ‘It Was A Terrible Idea’: Baden Cooke Reveals What Went Down With Hayley’s Betrayal
Gerald felt that to take out someone in his direct alliance, when there were still five Brains in the opposing alliance, was a silly idea and that doing so would have put him “in jeopardy”. So, all Gerald wanted was to take out one more Brain, and then he’d turn his sights to Emmett.
But instead of going with his initial plan to vote out a Brains member, Dani’s inconsistency in their alliance enlarged the target on her back, and they felt it was more important to vote for her next.
“Going into tribal, I was planning to vote out Dani because she was flipping back and forth and she was playing an extremely volatile game at that point. Even though I already knew for a long time at this point that George was the one leaking information from one side to the other, I thought that by playing the vote on an OG Brawn, he would stick with the alliance for this vote at least, which obviously didn’t happen.”
Despite Hayley warning the Brawn alliance that George was playing both sides, they decided to continue working with him because they “didn’t know the complete extent” of his loyalty or disloyalty, and Gerald had his own plan to work with Hayley in the future.
“I had a very strong inkling that there would be a redemption or exile, and that either Baden or Hayley would come back, so I said to Hayley in the moment after she got voted out, “I believe you.” I whispered it in her ear when I hugged her, in the hope that if she came back, we could form an alliance and target George in the near future.
“I just hoped that by targeting a Brawn in this next vote where I go home, I was hoping George would vote with us because it was someone he was gunning against as well, but he didn’t.”
Read More: All The Major Bombshells That Shook Australian Survivor This Week
At Tribal Council, Flick played her idol for Emmett, leaving Gerald unprotected and allowing George to have Gerald voted out because of his strong loyalty to Emmett.
“The thought process behind the idol is we thought they would vote for Emmett, so Flick would play the idol for Emmet and negate those votes and we would make sure we had the vast majority on Dani, so she would go home.”
But then me and Flick talked about it ourselves, just the two of us, and I suggested maybe we should play it for myself, and then I went back on it and Flick said, ‘whatever you think we should do, we will do.’ And I said to her, ‘Oh, nah, I’m just being silly, of course they won’t vote for me tonight,’ and they did.”
Was Gerald surprised when his name was pulled out of the urn?
“Yes and no. I always knew there was a chance, I just vastly underestimated that chance of George flipping in that moment. It was a surprise, but the moment they read out my name, it also wasn’t a surprise. I was like, yep, here we go.”
Even though Gerald is out of the game, he’s still got a massive decision to make now that he’s the second member of the Jury.
“Being in the Jury certainly is the consolation prize. To have that say and to be able to find those truths you’ve been searching for and the answers you were wondering [about] following Tribal Council.”
Gerald now has a say in who will win Survivor Australia: Brains V Brawn. And a strong social game is what he’ll be looking for.
“The biggest objective in Survivor is social game - that’s where it’s at. You can be the best sporting competitor out there, but if you’ve got no social game, you’re cooked right from the start. It’s the same with strategy, you can have the best strategy out there, you can make a big move at every turn, but if you’ve got no social game, no one is going to vote for you anyway, so you still can’t win.
“I’m looking for someone that’s got a bit of strategy, a bit of physical and a lot of social, and the people who tick that box for me is Flick, she’s a really strong athlete, Emmett is also a strong athlete, and he stays in good with everyone, and then other than that, Hayley.
Read More: ‘Should’ve Played My Idol’: Kez McGee Voted Off Australian Survivor Right After Merge
“She’s an awesome strategist and also has really good social skills. But at the moment, she’s sort of put her foot in it. But she’s got potential to be able to come back into the game if she wants to and move forward and still form connections with people. They will be my pick for three, I think.”
Gerald has played a great game, with a focus on his social connections and with honesty at the core of his strategy from day dot.
“My strategy going into the game was to play the social game and become close with basically every other castaway, and that was what I did, and that’s why I had no votes against me until I got voted out.
“I also wanted to play the most honest game of Survivor that’s ever been played -- to use truth as my biggest weapon in the game. I used it to open cans of worms and throw the truth at people and see how they came back and let them dig their own holes.”
