When the cameras stopped rolling on series five of the ITV reality programme The Games – in which celebrities competed against each other in Olympic-style sports such as diving and weightlifting – two of its star competitors could often be seen in deep conversation, giggling together.
In the vast grounds of the Crystal Palace National Sports Centre in south-east London, Christine McGuinness and Chelcee Grimes, a former footballer and musician, soon became something of a clique within the group of 12 stars.
Their friendship was noted early on in the filming, back in the spring of 2022, and perhaps it was inevitable. They are both from working-class backgrounds in Liverpool and Christine in particular felt this was something they could bond over. It wasn’t long before they became inseparable on set. Yet things didn’t stop quite there, it seems.
When Christine decided to end her 11-year marriage to presenter husband Paddy, the relationship between the two women eventually became something rather closer. Yesterday Christine, 37 and a mother of three, spoke out about ‘blurred line’ friendships, confessing she has been in same-sex relationships in the past.
Speaking on Elizabeth Day’s How To Fail podcast, she revealed she had dated girls since she was a teenager. ‘It shouldn’t matter, somebody’s gender,’ she said.
‘It never mattered to me, which was why once me and my ex-husband were separated and I met people, I didn’t properly date.
‘It was more like, blurred, the lines of friendships for me, that was normal. It felt comfortable because I’d done that as a teen and… dated both men and women.’
She added she doesn’t have a label for her sexuality, but considers herself a ‘free spirit’.
Checlee, left, was there for Christine when Paddy did not publicly support his wife
Now I can reveal the truth about Christine’s and Chelcee’s friendship – and why, despite being pictured kissing at Hyde Park’s Winter Wonderland in December 2022 and in Ibiza the following summer, they for so long refused to acknowledge anything romantic.
Friends of Christine tell me that Chelcee – who used to date Love Island’s Megan Barton-Hanson – was an important presence in her life as her marriage to Paddy began to implode.
Chelcee ‘was there’ for her during those difficult weeks filming The Games when Paddy, 51, did not publicly support his wife, with many viewers taking to social media to question his lack of encouragement.
‘Chelcee was a very strong catalyst in Christine having the confidence to end her marriage to Paddy,’ a friend of Christine tells me. ‘It was during the show that Christine found her independence. She hadn’t really been part of the celebrity circuit before that because she had been at home bringing up the children while Paddy was out working.
‘Then she found herself mixing with lots of new people and she heard things that made her question her life and what she wanted out of it.
‘Christine clicked with Chelcee. And when just a few months later she and Paddy announced they’d split, they became closer still.’
Sources tell me that Paddy did not approve of his estranged wife’s friendship with Chelcee. ‘He hated it,’ claimed one. ‘Probably because Chelcee had given Christine this wonderful confidence that gave her the strength to move on.
‘During The Games, Christine realised marriage to Paddy wasn’t what she wanted long term so she got out, with Chelcee’s help. Up until then she just had Paddy in her ear, all of the time.’
Despite no longer being married,the couple still live together with their children
As one friend of Christine points out, they are likely to be living in the same property for some time after Paddy insisted on putting the house on the market for £6.5million
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The two women then went on to ‘live their best lives’ according to a friend. Despite appearing regularly on each other’s social media, however, they never admitted they were a couple and fobbed off journalists whenever asked.
And then suddenly, in September 2023, relations between the pair seemed to sour. Both unfollowed each other on social media and, despite sharing the same showbusiness agent, they are thought to have very little communication today.
It seems Christine was not ready to talk openly about her sexuality. Today, however, she is – sources close to her tell me she’d been planning to discuss it for some months as part of a big PR campaign to accompany her appearance on reality show Celebs Go Dating.
And yet last month, just three days after arriving in Ibiza to start filming, Christine suddenly pulled out of the Channel 4 TV programme.
In a statement she insisted she had signed up with ‘great intentions’, but had ‘realised that dating on a public platform and the attention that it brings is just too soon for me’. She was, she said, going home to her family.
Indeed, despite no longer being married, she and Paddy still live together with the children, twins Leo and Penelope, 11, and eight-year-old Felicity.
Now friends of Christine claim Paddy may also lie behind her reasons for withdrawing from the show. I’m told he didn’t know she was going on it and was not aware she would be dating women as well as men.
The sources also say that the former Top Gear star was fearful of Christine talking about what went on in their marriage while she was on the show.
It could possibly have contravened a non-disclosure agreement friends of Christine claimed Paddy insisted she sign upon their break-up (which he vehemently denied).
Does this explain why Christine’s comments about her ex were scant in yesterday’s podcast? Indeed, she was remarkably positive about the former Question of Sport host, whom she is said by friends to ‘despise’ despite still sharing the marital home in Cheshire.
And as one friend of Christine points out, they are likely to be living in the same property for some time to come because Paddy recently insisted on putting it on the market for what could be considered an over-inflated price tag of £6.5 million – £4.4 million more than the £2.1 million they paid for it in 2020.
She said: ‘Christine is going to be living with Paddy for some time yet which leaves her with quite a wait to start her life with someone new, especially if it’s with a woman.’