Sofia Vergara’s ex Joe Manganiello hits back: ‘Simply not true’

Actor Joe Manganiello has publicly hit back at claims Sofia Vergara made about the reason behind their surprise break-up.

Joe Manganiello has hit out at Sofia Vergara’s claim that they ended up ending their relationship over his desire to have children.

Vergara had previously revealed in Spanish newspaper El País that her ex-husband’s hopes for more children was the deciding factor in their decision to split.

“My marriage broke up because my husband was younger; he wanted to have kids and I didn’t want to be an old mum,” she said. “I had a son at 19, who is now 32, and I’m ready to be a grandmother, not a mother. So, if love comes along, he has to come with (his own) children.”

Joe Manganiello has hit back at Sofia Vergara’s claims about their split. Picture: Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images for TNT

In a new interview with Men’s Journal, Manganiello has denied such claims, and said they’re “simply not true”.

“There’s been a lot said in the press about me wanting a family. That’s simply not true,” he said.

“We did try to have a family for the first year and a half.

“And we had a huge conversation right out of the gate during the first month we dated. I said, ‘If you’re done with kids, then I understand. Just tell me, and I’ll know what this is, and that’s OK.’ But that wasn’t the case with her. And I swore to her that I would never leave if it didn’t work out. And I didn’t.”

Though he said he does want to have children, Manganiello told the publication that “wasn’t inevitably why everything ended” between them.

Vergara had suggested their split because she didn’t want to be an ‘old mum’. Picture: John Shearer/Getty Images

Instead he claimed that they split because they “grew apart, and sometimes that happens.”

“To be painted as if I had some sort of midlife crisis, and after nine years, turned to somebody and gave them an ultimatum of, ‘Do this potentially unhealthy thing to your body, or else I’m gone?’ That’s never who I was.”

Vergara and Manganiello announced their split after seven years of marriage in a joint statement last July.

“We have made the difficult decision to divorce,” the couple said. “As two people that love and care for one another very much, we politely ask for respect for our privacy at this time as we navigate this new phase of our lives.”