Think men on online dating sites are dodgy? Meet the sex-mad women!

WE’VE all heard about the bad behaviour of men who date online: the married ones just out for casual sex, the ‘successful businessmen’ who turn out to be minicab drivers and the ‘spontaneous risk takers’ who are, in truth, crashing bores. But as it is reported that one in every five relationships now begins via the web, four men turn the tables and reveal to ANTONIA HOYLE their often hilarious encounters with women looking for love . . . SHE FLASHED A LEG AS SHE MADE DINNER

My date had the same dark blonde hair as her profile photo had suggested and her facial features were similar.

But in the flesh she was plain and dumpy, not sylph-like and pretty, and as soon as I spotted her waiting for me in a bar in Canterbury for our first date in January 2010, it was clear she had doctored her picture.

Incensed, I walked up to her and roared ‘you’re not tall and thin!’ before storming straight out again.

Harsh? Perhaps. But, by that point, I’d been internet dating for two years and had been told one lie too many.

It wasn’t to be the last either. When a beautiful cafe owner I met later that year flashed her stockings while cooking me roast lamb at her pretty house a few miles away, I was entranced.

the lamb was left uneaten. But after seducing me, she admitted she was not 55, as she’d claimed, but 60.

‘all women lie about their age online to get men’s interest,’ she explained. another one bit the dust. If a woman was prepared to lie so early on in our relationship, it didn’t have a future.

I’ve always been truthful. I began online dating six months after my wife Christabel and I separated five years ago. It seemed more convenient than using the lonely hearts columns and I felt I was too old to chat up women in bars and clubs.

I stated clearly on my profile ‘ my past is part of me’ because Christabel and I remain great friends.

We enjoy regular Sunday lunches together and if there’s someone I’m considering introducing our sons to, Christabel — who’s been with a new boyfriend for the past two years — will meet her first. Carleton Smith, 55, is a divorced private chef from Chilham, Kent. he has been internet dating since he and his wife of seven years, Christabel, 49, a writer, separated in 2008. they have two sons, aged 11 and ten.

Do

My dates feel threatened? Probably. My longest relationship was with alison, a 50- something financial broker I met online in July 2010. But I was torn between spending time with alison and seeing my boys.

after two years, she ended it, saying she didn’t feel like a big enough part of my life. For the first two years of dating online, I subscribed to a dating service run by one national newspaper. But the women on it just seemed obsessed with sex.

on my first date, a stunning solicitor turned up at my home in a BMW and designer dress. a mere five minutes after we met, she suggested the pair of us perform an unprintable sex act.

I’m no prude, but I was shocked. When I said I wanted her to leave she looked taken aback, as if I should have been turned on. Men are often lambasted for sexual malpractice with women they meet online, but women, it seems to me, are by far the more permissive gender.

Now, I am on match.com, which bills itself as Britain’s biggest online dating website for professionals.

For the last few months, I have been seeing a chef my age I met on the site. She is, to put it bluntly, bonkers. Before we even met, she admitted she’d come to snoop through the windows of my house to check I was above board. Nor are my children overly enamoured with her.

once she threw their clothes out of the window in a bizarre attempt to make them laugh. Suffice to say, I don’t see a future with her.

But I will keep searching. My Mrs Right must be out there somewhere and the statistics suggest that if I keep looking online, I’ll find her.

TEARS WHEN I TURNED DOWN SEX

Peter JoneS, 45, an author from Southendon-Sea, essex, started internet dating seven years ago after his wife Kate, an entrepreneur, died suddenly of a brain haemorrhage, aged just 39.

My date interrupted my nervous small talk to ask about the platinum band on my finger. ‘It’s my wedding ring,’ I said. Looking at her horrified expression, I added hastily: ‘My wife died.’

Her disgust turned to sympathy, but it was an awkward introduction to internet dating. the next day I changed my profile to read ‘widowed a few months ago’. I didn’t want to make a big deal of it, but I hoped a brief summary of my marital status would explain my presence online. I also hoped, selfishly, it would