“Youth With You 3” (青春有你 3) went through its first official ranking and elimination on the March 20 episode. Hot favorite trainee, Tony Yu Jingtian (余景天), was ranked 1st with almost 6 million more points than the second place trainee, Liang Sen (梁森).

In the closing remarks of his speech at his position, Tony Yu said, “The last point I want to make is, who said the first center will be the final center?” This earned a lot of oohs and ahs from the trainees in the crowd. The camera also panned to Luo Yizhou (罗一舟) who beat out Tony Yu by 2 votes from his peers to become the center of the theme song. Tony Yu continues saying, “This year I can only break this rule with tears.”, and ends it with a bow. Luo Yizhou stands up and says to Tony Yu, “Tony, I really admire what you just expressed before. So let’s use the stage to speak for itself.” It was met with oohs and claps from the crowd again. Liang Sen responds, “I feel like I am unnecessary again.”

What Tony Yu meant by first center is the center of the theme song. In “Idol Producer” and “Youth With You” history, the center of the theme song always debuted as the center of the group, i.e. Cai Xukun in NINE PERCENT, Li Wenhan in UNINE, and Liu Yuxin in THE9. Conversely on the “Produce 101 China” and “CHUANG” side, the center of the theme song is always cursed and has historically NEVER debuted in the group, i.e. Li Zixuan finished 12th in “Produce 101 China”, Rex Lin Huanjun rumored to have been removed from the show due to alleged politically sensitive posts in “CHUANG 2019”, and Lin Junyi finished 10th “CHUANG 2020” with only 7 debut spots that year.

Even though Luo Yizhou was the center of the theme song, he was ranked 14th in the first official ranking, which shocked many of his peers. Many trainees felt he should’ve been in the top 9. Luo Yizhou also seemed a bit disappointed when he was announced in 14th place.

Credit: Weibo (1, 2)