Ever made eye contact with a beautiful stranger, only to bottle out of making an approach at the last minute? Ever stressed about what to wear, what to talk about on a first date?

"If you're going to take your first date to a cosy pub in the country, you shouldn't turn up looking like you're out for a night clubbing with half a ton of glitter in your hair and a little strappy top."

"You have to dodge the minefield and walk away unscathed. Be confident of what you are going to say - you can't just wing it.

"Many people are nervous, so they start drinking quickly or have a swifty or two before the date. This just makes them look quite sweaty, quite flushed," says Jay.

To avoid the weight of expectation, Steven suggests pretending you are auditioning for a new friend.

"Ask yourself, 'Is this someone I wouldn't mind going down to the pub with for a beer?' If you've got that going on in your head, it takes the pressure off wondering if they want to see you again."

Steven's solution? Be up to speed on the current events of the day, both hard-edged and tabloid trashy.

And meet for lunch if at all possible. "The beauty with lunch is that after a couple of hours, you are free to go. If you're getting on like a house on fire, you can keep it going."

Treat the date like episode one of An Audience With, and don't give away too much about yourself.

"Work out three or four questions that you'd love to be asked and then ask them of the person you're with. They'll answer the question, then reciprocate - and you'll have this comfortable anecdote to recount."

Before and after: From "just a mum" to dating diva

"She just looked completely slobby," Jay says. "She went on her dummy date wearing her hair in bunches and she fidgeted with her clothes the whole way through."

The team urged Janine to think of herself as a woman, not "just a mum". Jay banned bunches and got her used to wearing sunglasses on school and supermarket runs.

"By the end, she said she felt like an All Saint."

Before and after: From mummy's boy to lady's man

"On his dummy date, he looked like a pastiche of a '50s matinee idol because his mum was advising him on what to wear," Jay says.

But by week six, he had peroxided his hair and snapped off the "George's room" sign on his bedroom door.

"He hadn't asked a girl out before he came on our show," Steven says. "George now is dangerous. There is no-one he will not chat up."

With that sort of intensive coaching, no wonder Would Like to Meet has a higher success rate than the get-'em-drunk-and-see-'em-snog dating shows.

Would Like to Meet starts Saturday 8 September, 7pm on BBC2.

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I had a first date with a vision, whom I believed was THE picture of vulnerable femininity. At an expensive restaurant, she described the steak she wanted as "cut off the horns and bring it in - I want it rare". The waiter recovered, I didn't.
Dave, United States

I had my first banana daiquiri on a first date, and after about 20 minutes was so sleepy, I had to ask the guy to stop at a park so I could get a few minutes sleep on the grass...
Eilat, Argentina

I went on a date with a seemingly sharp-dressing TV reporter. When he came to pick me up, he was wearing "little boy" shorts and socks pulled halfway up his calves. Obviously TV stylists were behind the initial attraction.
Elizabeth, NZ

I once went on a blind date set up by an (ex) friend. The girl turned up in a Celtic football shirt, got falling-down drunk, told me I look like Patrick Swayze and punched me in the groin.
Jon, Belgium

I was staring at the coffee in a supermarket. A woman came up beside me. After a pause she said in a cool tone, while still looking at the coffee: "Do you see anything you like?" I was so dumbstruck I missed the moment.
Ricardo Nunnini, England

I went to a beer tasting with a journalist, who spent the evening making silly comments and drinking as much free beer as he could. Then he tried to make a move on me after telling me about his girlfriend and their sex life.
Chris, UK

I got talking to a lovely girl at a nightclub, and I thought I'd seen her working at a local bar a year before. I asked if she worked there, and got an evil look. Later a friend informed me it had changed to a strip joint.
Wakefield Turner, Birmingham

Have an exclusion zone around your neighbourhood. I dated a guy who lives in my street. After several months it ended very bitterly. I see him every morning on my way to work and every week in the supermarket.
Andrew Kenny, UK

I turned up to a date with a woman I had met in a pub to discover she'd invited me to an outing with her singles club. I spent the evening being stared at and cross examined by the other "lonely hearts".
Marcus Fry, UK

Whatever you do, DON'T find a date over the internet. It's too easy for (both parties) to pretend to be something they're not.
Karl, UK

I met my husband over the net and nobody can ever believe it, we're both so "normal". Just be careful and follow all the common sense guidelines.
Emma, UK

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