Strictly Come Dancing 2016 starts on Saturday. You know the lineup. You may already have your favourites. But only I know for sure where each of the contestants will rank.
Here they are, in reverse order. You are welcome.
15. Danny Mac
Danny Mac is an actor who has never knowingly done a shirt all the way up. He’s hoping to use his appearance as a platform to raise awareness of people like him, by donating his fee to the Silly Men With Chilly Nipples Foundation.
14. Judge Rinder
Nobody in the history of mankind has ever wanted to be famous as badly as Judge Rinder. Unfortunately, he presents a show where he decides whether people should get refunds for their faulty guttering. It airs on ITV during the day between adverts for no-win-no-fee injury compensation lawyers. That absolutely doesn’t count.
13. Ed Balls
Only entering Strictly Come Dancing as an experiment to see how long it takes the British public to grow tired of people repeating the words “Ed Balls” in an infuriatingly LOLsy way over and over again. Prediction: it will take three weeks.
12. Ore Oduba
Former Newsround presenter Oduba has already appeared on Let’s Dance for Comic Relief – where he lost. This is bad news because, unlike Let’s Dance for Comic Relief, his competitors aren’t all middle-aged comedians in funny wigs.
11. Louise Redknapp
Having just watched a video of Eternal performing on Top of the Pops, I can state with certainty that Louise Redknapp is well versed in the following dances: the Upwards Point, the Downwards Point, the Walking Backwards and Forwards Like a Mum at a Wedding, and the Crouching Like You’re Trying to Wee Into a Thimble During a Hurricane. None of these are formally recognised ballroom disciplines.
10. Laura Whitmore
Fulfilling this year’s quota of women who have presented things you’ve never watched is Laura Whitmore. She looks as if she might have had dance training, doesn’t she? If that’s the case, she should brace herself for most of Twitter calling her a cheat every week for four months.
9. Anastacia
Anastacia is this year’s big-ticket foreign import contestant. And she’s surely doomed to failure from the outset. By the time her partner has explained why the studio audience finds the sight of an old man saying the word “seven” so delightful, she won’t have any time left to train.
8. Melvin Odoom
Desperate for a big break, Melvin Odoom co-hosted last year’s Xtra Factor. And he co-hosted ITV2’s Brit awards red carpet show. And he co-hosted an ITV Saturday night gameshow called Bang on the Money that nobody has ever heard of. Odoom is so keen for Strictly to push him over the top that he’ll inevitably be disqualified a month in, for kneecapping Greg Rutherford with a ball hammer.
7. Claudia Fragapane
Fragapane could do very well. At 18 years old, she has youth on her side, and as a professional gymnast, she’s in good athletic shape. However, ask yourself this: is Strictly Come Dancing a show about celebrating 18-year-old women? The answer is no. It’s a show about your mum wishing actors would unbutton their shirts a bit more.
6. Lesley Joseph
Although Lesley Joseph will not be the most naturally gifted dancer on this year’s Strictly Come Dancing, she will nevertheless be the contestant most willing to react to Craig Revel Horwood’s barbed putdowns by winking and one-handedly hoisting her bosom. This will endear her to the audience but infuriate Laura Whitmore, who will lose to her in a controversial dance-off after six weeks.
5. Naga Munchetty
BBC newsreader Naga Munchetty plays golf almost constantly, to a near professional level. This, on some level, makes her the spiritual successor to Bruce Forsyth, which means we can expect to see her interrupt every routine to haltingly read a bad joke from a big-print teleprompter.
4. Will Young
Can Will Young dance? I can’t remember. I think he tried dancing on Pop Idol once, and ended up looking like he was trying to screw in an ellipsoidal lightbulb with his feet. And from memory, the vast majority of his music videos are of him glumly standing in angular poses dressed as a sad French mime artist. Does that count?
3. Greg Rutherford
Although I’ve never met the man, my son is friends with Greg Rutherford’s son. Please take this ambiguously worded, vaguely high-placed ranking as a reflection of that.
2. Daisy Lowe
An admission: I initially placed Daisy Lowe this high because I remembered once seeing a video of her dancing. However, I now realise that a) the video is six years old, and b) she doesn’t so much dance as flap about in her pants, in a manner that suggests she’s discreetly trying to avoid a swarm of bees.
1. Tameka Empson
Good lord, this woman is a force of nature. I stood 20 metres away from her about six years ago, and I’m still piecing my skull together. Tameka Empson will destroy Strictly Come Dancing. Literally destroy it. She’ll flail and scream so much that the studio will collapse, leaving only her standing and she’ll win by default.
