Dan Whiston promises best ever DOI semi-final

Dan Whiston thinks the upcoming \'Dancing On Ice\' semi-final will be the "best" the show has ever seen.

The 47-year-old skater - who serves as creative director on the competition - can\'t wait to see the "drama" unfold at the weekend because the standard set by remaining celebrity contestants James Jordan, Wes Nelson, Brian McFadden and Saara Aalto and their professional partners has been so high.

He said in his weekly Mirror Online column: "I can\'t wait to see what drama the semi-final brings especially knowing some of the things being planned by our skating stars. I think it will be our best semi-final show of any series!"

Wes Nelson says he's a millionaire and never has to work again

Last weekend saw Melody Thornton and Alexander Demetriou voted off after competing in the skate-off against Saara and her partner Hamish Gaman, and Dan has praised the former \'X Factor\' contestant for always responding well to criticism from the judges.

He said: "Melody and Saara put on such amazing performances in the skate-off that the judges had an extremely hard decision to make but in the end they chose to save Saara...

"Saara and her partner Hamish were criticised by the judges for playing it a bit too safe [in their main performance]. One thing I really like about Saara, is she always takes onboard all the judges comments and works hard to improve every week."

'She is so chilled': James Jordan praises supermum Ola

The Judge\'s Challenge on last weekend\'s show was an unassisted jump and the skating expert admitted all of the celebrities found it tough.

He said: "This week our celebrities were skating for a place in the semi-final so everyone went full out to impress the judges. They were set the challenge of putting jumps into their routines, which had most of them in a bit of a tail spin."

Dan joined a number of the show\'s professionals for a group performance and though he enjoyed being on the ice, he was left in pain afterwards.

'I'm too old, too fat and too slow': James Jordan rules out Strictly return

He admitted: "I loved getting my skates back on and joining the professionals for a group performance that I choreographed. It was a really full-on routine that ended with me being flipped backwards.....I think I might need to borrow Brian McFadden\'s back brace for a few days to help me recover!"