By Rob Harris
London: Forget Bridgerton or The Crown. The real-life feud between two WAGs – wives and girlfriends of England football stars – is the only British drama captivating a nation right now.
Two-and-a-half years after Coleen Rooney, the wife of legendary Manchester United striker Wayne, accused her former friend Rebekah Vardy as being the source of several stories about her in the British press, the highly anticipated, tabloid-titillating “Wagatha Christie” libel trial came to a close on Thursday at London’s Royal Courts of Justice.
The media pack outside Court 13, where the biggest tabloid feud in Britain is laid bare. Credit: Getty
For seven days, the Rooneys and the Vardys swapped Wembley for the front row of the historic Court 13 as Justice Karen Steyn heard accusations of planting gossip in the press, lost evidence, who unfollowed whom on Instagram, and – unexpectedly – the size of Australian pop star Peter Andre’s manhood. It has pushed the recent soap opera of the royal family off the front pages.
The trial has switched from drama to comedy in the blink of an eye, mainly courtesy of the sharp-tongued cross-examination from Rooney’s barrister David Sherborne, once nicknamed “Orange Sherbert” because of his “boyish, tanned” golden glow with a “metropolitan bouffant of hair”.
On her third day in the witness box, Vardy, wearing a vintage Chanel dress, huge cat-eye sunglasses and her hair wound in a tight bun, lost her cool and was twice reduced to tears. Once while recalling the horrific online abuse she received following Rooney’s viral post and a second time when Sherborne accused her of throwing Watt “under the bus”.
This court sketch shows Coleen Rooney’s barrister David Sherborne, centre back, questioning Rebekah Vardy, watched by Wayne and Coleen Rooney. Credit: PA
Vardy has been accused of destroying incriminating evidence by deleting text messages and lying about it under oath. The strange disappearance of the mobile phone belonging to her former agent Caroline Watt, allegedly accidentally dropped from a boat into the North Sea during a trip to Scotland last year, has also lent great intrigue.
But one message did survive to present to the court, a vital conversation where Vardy and Watt discussed Rooney’s fears on Twitter that she had been betrayed by someone she trusted. Watt said to her client: “It wasn’t someone she trusted. It was me.”
Rooney’s defence says it is “common sense” that Vardy knew that her agent was leaking information to The Sun even if “she was not the one that pulled the trigger”.
Rebekah Vardy in vintage Chanel - outfits have been watched as closely as testimony. Credit: Getty
Watt was ruled unfit to give oral evidence at the trial by a consultant forensic psychiatrist because of her fragile mental health.
When it emerged that WhatsApp messages from Watt’s phone at the time were lost at the bottom of the ocean, Sherborne lamented the fact the evidence needed now lay “in Davy Jones’ Locker”.
The court erupted when Vardy responded: “I’m sorry, I don’t know who Davy Jones is.” The judge then told her the reference was a figure of speech which “just means the bottom of the sea”.
There was laughter in court later when an interview Vardy gave about the case in 2019 was raised, in which she was asked whether she had tried to argue her case during a phone call with Rooney.
“That would be like arguing with a pigeon,” she said. “You can tell it that it’s wrong, but it’s still going to shit in your hair.”
It should have never really got this far, but both sides have deep pockets and damaged pride. After a lengthy and failed mediation, the saga has cost an estimated £3 million ($5.3 million) as the pair indulged in the best libel lawyers money can buy.
The case hinges on a social media post by Rooney in October 2019. Coleen, who at that point had been married to Wayne for 11 years, was devoting most of her time to bringing up their four boys, Kai, Klay, Kit and Cass. She’d grown increasingly suspicious about who’d been providing Fleet Street with stories about her.
The Rooneys had long been tabloid fodder. They began dating at the age of 16 in Liverpool and were married in 2008. Earlier this year, TV personality Coleen said she had forgiven Wayne for “cheating on her multiple times”, including for allegations a decade ago that he paid three sex workers to sleep with him while she was pregnant in 2002.
The Instagram trap
Rooney had an idea of who might be responsible for the leaks, discussed it with other WAGs, and then set a trap. She posted three false stories about herself, including one claiming she’d visited a “gender-selection clinic” in Mexico to ensure she became pregnant with a girl. She altered her privacy settings so only Vardy’s account would see the posts. When these duly appeared in print, Rooney decided she had her proof.
“I have saved and screenshotted all the original stories which clearly show just one person has viewed them,” she wrote on social media. “It’s … Rebekah Vardy’s account.” Thanks to the past seven days we now know this lengthy post was handwritten by Coleen and given to her brother to type out.
The sensational allegation and sting earned her the moniker “Wagatha Christie” – a tribute to the best-selling British author and creator of fictional supersleuths Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot.
Vardy immediately denied allegations and hit back on social media: “I wish you had called me if you thought this. I never speak to anyone about you, as various journalists who have asked me to over the years can vouch for ... I’m not being funny but I don’t need the money, what would I gain from selling stories on you?”
We now know that at the same time she sent a text to Watt, declaring: “That’s war.”
Coleen Rooney’s Instagram sting earned her the tabloid nickname “Wagatha Christie”. Credit: Getty
Vardy formally issued a writ for libel about six months later, with her lawyers objecting to the inference in Rooney’s post that their client “has consistently and repeatedly betrayed the defendant’s [Rooney’s] trust over several years by leaking the defendant’s private and personal Instagram posts and stories for publication in The Sun”.
Attempts to broker a peace followed, but neither woman would back down.
Vardy, 40, was working as a nightclub promoter when she met her future footballer husband. She cashed in on the limelight after he helped Leicester City to its unlikely Premier League title six years ago by appearing on I’m A Celebrity and Dancing On Ice, as well as becoming a regular on daytime chat television.
“That would be like arguing with a pigeon. You can tell it that it’s wrong, but it’s still going to shit in your hair.”
Rebekah Vardy
She became emotional when she told the court that she “didn’t do anything wrong” and wanted to clear her name, saying she had suffered from “constant anxiety” and “panic attacks”. At one stage she said she’d found the long process of giving evidence against her fellow WAG “exhausting and intimidating”, adding: “I feel I have been bullied and manipulated.”
WhatsApp messages provided to the court revealed Vardy had called Rooney “a c---” and a “bitch” when alerted by her publicist that she’d unfollowed her on social media.
“She thinks it’s me that’s been doing stories on her!” she said in the messages that followed. “Of all the people on her Instagram ffs!”
While Vardy brought the action, the case has been bruising for her reputation, with messages produced showing she tipped off journalists through Watt to in-fighting within her husband’s teams, leaked stories on other WAGs and alerted photographers to their whereabouts during the World Cup. She was forced to defend herself about leaking a “kiss-and-tell” to a tabloid years earlier about a sexual encounter with Andre, which carried the headline: “Peter’s hung like a small chipolata, shaved, slobbery, lasts five minutes.”
Rebekah Vardy and Jamie Vardy leave the Royal Courts of Justice, Strand on May 17, 2022 in London, England.Credit: Getty
Both husbands have supported their wives during the case, with Rooney, now manager of Derby County, even giving evidence. Vardy, who scored four goals while the case was going on, made his High Court debut on day six, arriving hand-in-hand with his wife. The football stars seemed to acknowledge one another at first, unlike their other halves.
Hugh Tomlinson, QC, Vardy’s barrister, told the court in his closing submission that his client “does not know to this day” who leaked the stories, but accepted that “the obvious suspect is Caroline Watt”.
“She does not want to be in the position of accusing her friend and former long-time agent of doing something wrong.
“Throughout this case, [Vardy] has sought to find out the position. The very first thing she said to Mrs Rooney was ‘send me the evidence, send me the posts’.”
Tomlinson said as a result of the untrue defamatory allegation, Vardy had suffered severe harm to her reputation and huge distress and upset.
The trial has had no jury, which has liberated the 12 seats of the jury box for use by journalists covering the case. It is now up to Steyn to decide who picks up the terrifying bill in the weeks to come.
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