The audacity of wannabe WAGs won’t ever stop to amaze me. Early on in my marriage to Chelsea and Tottenham Hotspur defender Jason Cundy, I made the error of leaving him alone at a soccer get-together whereas I went to get some drinks on the bar. The second I left the desk, one other girl slipped into my empty seat.
All legs, large hair, lashings of make-up and oozing intercourse enchantment, she should have been watching and ready, able to pounce after I disappeared, nevertheless fleetingly.
Tall and darkish, Jason had Hollywood beauty and the pay packet to match. Everywhere we went, girls’s eyes would observe him. To be truthful, although our marriage in the end didn’t final, he was by no means one among life’s pure flirts.
When I returned to my seat, the opposite girl did a minimum of have the decency to skulk off. But that’s when it struck me – this was how my marriage can be. As quickly as I turned my again, predatory girls can be making an attempt to lure Jason away from me.
So, I can think about simply how unhealthy the previous few years should have been for Annie Kilner, the now-estranged spouse of England ace Kyle Walker.
Lizzie Cundy and her ex Jason had been collectively for 19 years and married for 15
As quickly as I turned my again, predatory girls can be making an attempt to lure Jason away from me, writes Lizzie Cundy, pictured together with her ex in 2007
While lovely Annie has been at dwelling taking care of their three sons – and is now pregnant with a fourth baby – Kyle has been enjoying away with mannequin and social media influencer Lauryn Goodman. If she was even half-aware of what was occurring, poor Annie would have been in a state of everlasting paranoia.
Although Kyle and Annie solely married in 2021, they’ve been collectively since assembly of their dwelling metropolis of Sheffield when Walker was 17 and Kilner was 15.
Kyle, in the meantime, allegedly had a fling with Lauryn in 2019 ensuing within the beginning of a kid the next 12 months. Lauryn has since had a second child by the dishonest footballer.
Although Lauryn should have identified precisely what she was doing, I can’t assist feeling nearly sorry for her — there may be already hypothesis that Kyle has had a 3rd girl on the go. Now Lauryn may have the unenviable job of making an attempt to maintain Kyle’s consideration – whereas preventing off different ruthless and impressive girls.
After that incident with Jason on the Chelsea soccer social, I might be sure that to ask one other spouse or girlfriend to look at my chair if I needed to pop to the toilet, even on the best night time out on the pub. After all, bagging a footballer means the prospect to show left on the plane of life – so girls are queuing as much as usurp you.
So, I can think about simply how unhealthy the previous few years should have been for Annie Kilner , the now-estranged spouse of England ace Kyle Walker
There is already hypothesis that Kyle has had a 3rd girl on the go
When your worst worry comes true, it’s devastating. Jason and I cut up up after I found he was seeing a youthful girl in 2010. We’d been married for eight years and had two sons, then aged 5 and one. But regardless of a lifetime of vigilance, I couldn’t cease it taking place ultimately.
So, I think Annie shall be feeling very lonely proper now. She most likely doesn’t know the place to show or who to belief. Football golf equipment take care of their very own; wives aren’t included in that equation.
As for Lauryn, I get it. She fell for him and desires to be with him. But, let’s be trustworthy, she additionally needs the life-style Annie has loved until now.
As a footballer’s spouse, you get a sixth sense for these artful varieties. No matter what number of assurances of constancy your husband provides you, you should at all times be on pink alert.
After a match, many footballers – married or not – need to have fun a win at a nightclub or bar. That’s the place these girls are ready, dressed up and ready to pounce. I’d go as far to say an entire business is concerned: the mannequin and expertise businesses who signify these girls and the nightclub managers who allow them to know the crew are coming in for the night time.
They need males like Kyle Walker to spend 5 figures on an evening out impressing girls with bottle after bottle of fancy fizz. It doesn’t excuse anybody’s behaviour, however when girls, dressed to the nines, are on faucet for younger footballers, what do you assume goes to occur?
Life within the soccer bubble – that’s a world the place soccer comes first and every thing else second – implies that as a spouse you want broad shoulders, pores and skin as thick as a Hermes bag and eyes at the back of your head always.
Jason and I had been collectively for 19 years, married for 15. We met after I was 19 and he was 18. He was an apprentice with Chelsea and as their coaching floor was close to my Richmond dwelling, he pursued me after we met in a neighborhood bar.
I used to be seeing another person on the time, but ultimately I gave in as a result of he was humorous and my pals favored him. The similar can’t be mentioned for my dad and mom. My mum, Gloria Miller, now 88, was a trend mannequin earlier than operating the Jaeger trend label. My late father, Derek Miller, was a Saatchi and Saatchi artwork director, working with the likes of David Bailey on glamorous shoots. We lived in a good looking Victorian home and my dad and mom can be at events most Saturday evenings with well-known actors and names within the leisure business.
Mum wasn’t impressed that I’d fallen for a footballer. She would have most well-liked me to calm down with a health care provider or lawyer.
In the early days, I used to be modelling and going to drama college – and incomes greater than Jason. Yet when he joined the primary crew two years later, life modified dramatically. We moved right into a two-bedroom condo in Chelsea Harbour, overlooking the Thames.
Robbie Williams was a everlasting fixture on the Conran Hotel reverse — I’d typically say good day and chat to him and his father.
We had our son Josh after I was 25 and married a 12 months later. We had been supplied a profitable journal deal, however turned it down – although Jason was fairly a flash groom.
I wore a easy white gown, whereas he had a very loud jacket on with white trousers, no socks and white sneakers. He regarded like one thing from Miami Vice. I bear in mind my mum elevating an eyebrow and muttering one thing about how the groom isn’t speculated to upstage the bride.
Walker has been enjoying away with mannequin and social media influencer Lauryn Goodman
Away from social occasions, being a footballer’s spouse could be a very lonely existence
Back then, it wasn’t solely Jason who attracted consideration. From the phrase go, I used to be hit on by different gamers – even after I was with Jason. At one perform, a widely known footballer started to play footsie with me, tickling my leg. I used to be startled, particularly as Jason was proper subsequent to me. I made it very clear I solely had eyes for him.
Others left telephone numbers in my bag or notes asking me to name them. I put it right down to the competitiveness amongst gamers on and off the pitch.
Away from these social occasions, nevertheless, being a footballer’s spouse could be a very lonely existence. I’d simply had Josh, now 28, when Jason went on tour with Chelsea to Hong Kong. My dad and mom had been residing in Norfolk, and I used to be dwelling in London by myself.
The soccer world makes it very clear you’re quantity two within the marital pecking order and us wives actually did simply need to put up and shut up. Mum would (not very helpfully) remind me it was what I’d signed up for.
Christmas I significantly dreaded: my job was to maintain issues calm earlier than the Boxing Day match. Other sports activities would possibly take a Christmas break, however with Britain, the Boxing Day video games are a agency fixture within the Premier League. So, it fell to me to make sure that a day that was normally about all of the household ran like clockwork for Jason.
There was no query of fizz-fuelled brunch. I had to verify every thing was excellent so he was prepared for the following day. And if he was enjoying away, I knew ladies can be hitting on him, Christmas or no Christmas.
Then there’s the influence of all these membership transfers on a wedding. We moved 4 occasions in 5 years. After Chelsea, Jason performed for Tottenham Hotspur, Ipswich and Portsmouth. You will be informed on the final minute that your different half is being transferred to a different membership as a result of he isn’t enjoying nicely. And consider me, life may be very tough with an undesirable footballer.
The sudden strikes are like being within the Army. Even if the kids had been settled in nursery – off we went. Football is at all times going to return first. But even when your husband is on the best way down, girls will nonetheless do something to seduce them.
I used to be pregnant with my second son James in 2000 after I actually felt the WAG strain. I used to be very acutely aware about getting my determine again after I gave beginning. I had learn {that a} post-partum Victoria Beckham had bought again into her denims inside two weeks and felt strain to do the identical.
I nonetheless bear in mind a lady coming as much as me within the girls after a sport and saying, ‘I’m as match as a butcher’s canine! Why is he with you?’ I used to be too shocked to answer.
Girls will be fairly aggressive and if they need one thing they’ll go for it. The hassle is, the golf equipment need to indulge their stars. A participant at one among Jason’s golf equipment would convey his spouse one week, his girlfriend the following – and the membership knew all about it.
I used to be pals with loads of the wives, together with Coleen Rooney (who’s very publicly weathered plenty of Wayne’s affairs), Alex Gerrard (nonetheless married to Steven Gerrard after over 16 years) and Cheryl (who divorced Ashley Cole in 2016 after 4 years citing ‘unreasonable behaviour’).
During the 2006 World Cup – and no I can’t title names – plenty of high-profile wives and girlfriends got here to me for recommendation saying, ‘I know he’s dishonest, what do I do?’
That was the time the world went loopy for WAGs and my profession as a TV presenter started to take off. At the identical time, Jason’s soccer profession was on the wane.
Suddenly the tables had been turned, and I used to be the one travelling to New York and Los Angeles for conferences and filming for TV reveals. Until then, my life had revolved round Jason’s soccer and I wished my very own profession. When he stopped enjoying and my skilled life took off (at one level I used to be presenting three reveals on the similar time) that’s when issues ended between us.
But I used to be nonetheless heartbroken when Jason informed me issues had been over between us. I’d at all times thought marriage was for all times. I liked being married and taking care of my husband. What girl doesn’t need somebody to like and take care of? I can see now although that, after assembly in our teenagers, we’d grown aside.
The fallout for me was life-changing. I couldn’t eat, I regarded pale and drawn – and, after I realised Jason actually was leaving me, I wished to again out of my subsequent presenting job.
I rang my mum at one among my lowest factors, she mentioned: ‘There are people far worse off than you.’
It would possibly sound merciless, nevertheless it was what I wanted to listen to. I’d labored so laborious to get into tv, I knew it will be loopy to waste my alternatives, having performed second fiddle to Jason for therefore lengthy.
To be trustworthy, after we lastly divorced in 2012, it was a aid to flee the poisonous world of soccer. I may lastly lose the bimbo tag that comes with being labelled a WAG.
I can solely really feel sorry for wives and girlfriends as of late and need Annie Kilner all the perfect in rebuilding her life.
Today I’m on good phrases with Jason. If I’d have had daughters, I definitely wouldn’t have wished them to marry a footballer.