I agree. I have to wonder if the producers knew what they little twist would result in. Probst seemed pretty mad at the end of the challenge when be brought one of the puzzle pieces back to the losing team. (he would have realised that the girls would have purposefully lost).
I was very disapointed in Erik. When he found out that the girls had conspired to fail the challenge without consulting him, he should have switched to the new guys and voted one of the girls out (the blonde one seemed more stupid than the other). And by aligning with the 2 new guys, he would have helped them survive and thus gained a lot of respect from the 2 new guys who would have greatly helped him integrate into the greater tribe after the merge.
If the goal is to maintain as many of the people of your original tribe alive, then what the girls did wasn't stupid. Had they won the challenge, the other tribe would have voted todd or sharea. By failing the challenge, they were able to ensure the survival of their 2 expats in the other tribe and kill off one of the "enemy" who was now in their own tribe.
But this is extremely shortsighted.
Every extra day that an "ennemy" spends in a tribe increases odds of that person striking alliances and loyalty with those tribe members and thus losing loyalties with the former tribe's mates. Todd and Sharea may end up loyal to their new tribe, especially if they have noticed that Jean Robert is the next target.
Similarly, every day Aaron and James spend in that tribe would have increased the odds that they would become loyal to it. and made that tribe much much much stronger. James is now gone short of something serious happening with one of the girls. Even if Erik sides with him, they can't oust one of the girls. Hopefully James will realise he is toast and do to his new team what the girl did : sabotage the next challenges so that the team has 0 benefit from his presence. If he doesn't sabotage the challenge, the girrs might sabotage it anyways. But by sabotaging the first challenge, it also ensures they don't get the goodies like food etc.
In the end, that tribe, is toast. Hopefully there will be a twist later on where Aaron and James can be re-integrated into the game.
Oh, and does anyone really believe Erik's claim he is still a virgin ? With a dick and large glans that he has, it is quite hard to believe