Meghan Markle’s texts to X-Factor winner she pursued before Prince Harry

Shortly before she was set up on a blind date with Prince Harry, Meghan Markle pursued the winner of X Factor UK 2010.

He is the former X Factor winner who played an unlikely hand in shaping today’s royal family.

Matt Cardle, who became the most voted-for winner of the UK version of the show ten years ago, exchanged messages about going on a date with Meghan Markle shortly before she met future husband Prince Harry.

Matt, Meghan and Harry’s lives could all have been different had he started dating the then Suits TV star.

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Matt Cardle has opened up about the ‘weird’ situation. Picture: Getty Images.

Meghan reportedly spoke about going on a date with the singer. Picture: AFP.

Speaking to The Sun, Matt said: “It was just a very weird situation – very odd. And I really don’t know how it came about.

“Life’s got a course and I was not on that one. I’ve laughed about it, but it’s amazing thinking back.”

The pair started swapping messages in 2015 after Meghan, who was single and in the UK at the time, followed Matt on social media after his award-winning appearance in West End show Memphis.

But before the pair could hook up Matt, 37, got together with his current girlfriend Amber Hernaman, 29, and Meghan met Harry.

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Cardle, pictured with Dannii Minogue, won the X Factor in 2010. Picture: Getty Images.

Matt previously spoke about his contact with Meghan during an appearance on ITV’s Lorraine in 2019.

Meghan and Matt started chatting online when Meghan was recently divorced from her first husband Trevor Engelson.

“It was so little then and if not nothing now. Yeah, like I say it was nothing, it was absolutely nothing. It’s quite funny how something can be made up from nothing,” he said at the time.

It was previously claimed that, while “flattered”, Matt “ended up ghosting her” when he met his girlfriend, a source said.

Meghan met Prince Harry in July 2016 on a blind date, with the couple marrying in May 2018.

Meghan Markle, before she met Harry, pictured outside her Suits trailer. Picture: Instagram/Patrick Adams

Last month, Meghan publicly revealed she and Harry had lost their second child to miscarriage in a heartbreaking personal essay for The New York Times.

“It was a July morning that began as ordinarily as any other day: Make breakfast. Feed the dogs. Take vitamins. Find that missing sock. Pick up the rogue crayon that rolled under the table. Throw my hair in a ponytail before getting my son from his crib,” the 39-year-old wrote in an opinion piece called The Losses We Share.

Speaking about her now 18-month-old son with Prince Harry, Archie, she said: “After changing his diaper, I felt a sharp cramp. I dropped to the floor with him in my arms, humming a lullaby to keep us both calm, the cheerful tune a stark contrast to my sense that something was not right.

“I knew, as I clutched my firstborn child, that I was losing my second.”

In the searingly honest piece, Meghan wrote of lying in a hospital bed hours later and holding Prince Harry’s hand.

This article originally appeared in The Sun and was reproduced with permission