I was surprised & disappointed by Patsy Palmer, was expecting her to be better than that. With all her dancing & acting training since she's a child she's so wooden on saturday. Hope she gets better from here on.

Was surprised James Martin was better than I expected.

And Fiona, oh dear, even I have to admit & quite surprised how bad she was. But glad she got through & with Brendan as her partner hopefully she gets better & soon.

With regards to Zoe, she's ok, I thought the praises were slightly OTT.

The fact that none of them is outstanding on the first week, compared with Jill & Denise who really stood out from last series on it's first week showing, it'll be interesting to see how they will all improve as the show goes on.

I was quite pleased/relieved at Darren Gough - for such a big stocky guy he did much better than I'd hoped (although how exactly he can make his hands smaller...............) and the dancing is allegedy doing wonders for his knee injury, so that's a plus too.

I was pleasantly surprised by most of the men, maybe Dennis Taylor most of all as I was expecting him to be worse than that chap from last year who was first out.

I expected more of Patsy Palmer and Fiona Phillips

Colin Jackson! a great little mover I was quite surprised at Dennis Taylor, I expeced him to look wooden, but bless him, he did try and appeared to be enjoying himself,

I think that Colin and Zoe really did stand out... and I also think the standard was a lot higher as a whole - especially from the guys. Do you think they had extra weeks to practise before the first show this year?

better than i thought:
darren
zoe
colin
dennis (surprisingly as i thought he'd be another dickinson)
gloria (much as i can't stand her
james

worse than anticipated:
patsy
siobhan
fiona (my dog would have hung on better)

I thought all the guys did better than I was expecting them to, particuarly as they had to do a latin dance too. I think Ballroom Bill probably surprised me the most, he was miles better than I expected him to be. I was impressed with how much effort Darren and Colin put into their routines too.

Of the ladies I was expecting Patsy to be a lot better and I wasn't expecting Zoe to do as well as she did. I thought she was great, although having the lovely Ian as her partner probably helped.

Patsy was a disappointment, but I do think she'll get much better, Fiona was even worse then I'd been hoping and provided much amusement in my house . Zoe was far better then I thought, and looked great dancing with the lovely Ian. Dennis and Bill seemed to be having a ball and both put in far more into it then I was expecting - very clever dance routine by Bill's partner as well. Can't really comment on Darren or Colin and one's arms and the other's hips were completely distracting me

Lol! I find Ian's hips a big distraction! I find that I end up with my eyes glued to him the whole time in the latin dances as he just has such a great hip movement. Roll on Saturday and the Rumba I say!

Ahh yes, the lovely Ian, and what a lovely distration he is BTW, is what I read in the Mail on Saturday true about him and Denise now being an item

She said last night that she had had no dance training at all, and that people expected all actresses to have had dance training, and that she cried all Sunday as she was so upset.

I was expecting Colin Jackson to be good (he's sex on legs ) but James was better than I thought.

I was surprised by Patsy, but she explained why last night.

Darren I was also surprised at, thought he would have NO hip movement!

Colin I wasn't as they had already let slip he was great and atheletes are very nimble..look at Denise last year.

James..I see great potential for him.

And Bill, well what a sweetie.

I hear on the grapevine that Darrens fav dances are quickstep and the Jitterbug cant wait to see that

Colin was good though wonder how good his ballroom will be

James I dont see great potential for him he is ok

bill and Dennis both going out there to enjoy

I didn't see the entire programme, but I thought Dennis Taylor was surprisingly not as bad as I expected. Ditto Bill.

I think what made the difference was the fact that they really threw themselves into it. Quentin last year just hoofed his way through it. He (just about) did the steps, but put absolutely nothing else in. That always looks worse than someone who trips up, falls over, forgets the moves etc, but really tries.

IMO, it looks far worse to do all the moves but do them lacklustrely.

Darren Gough took part in a celebrity Weakest Link last night and said he had been having difficulties in rehearsals yesterday.

We got to see a bit of his hip movement though and it looked pretty good to me!