Chris Eagles' ex-fiancee slams Jennifer Metcalfe for ‘breaking girl code’ to date him

Posted Sunday, February 07, 2021 by Dailystar.co.uk

THE ex-fiancee of footie ace Chris Eagles was left heartbroken after learning her actress friend Jennifer Metcalfe had broken the girl code to date him.

Danielle Mitchinson was with the former Manchester United winger for eight years but dumped him in September — after taking relationship advice from Hollyoaks star Jennifer, 37.

Chris Eagles' ex has hit out at his new girlfriend Jennifer Metcalfe

The Sun revealed in December that Jennifer and Eagles, 35, had been secretly dating. And last week they were pictured together for the first time.

But Danielle, 30, told a close pal: “I thought Jen was my friend. I confided in her about our relationship and this is how she has repaid me. She has shown me no respect. Neither has he.

“There were rumours that they were seeing each other when we were together, which I didn’t believe because Jen said they weren’t true. She told me he wasn’t her type. Clearly he is now.

“It was Jen who gave me the push to finally leave him. Within weeks I found out they were together.

“She hasn’t said sorry, never apologised, the exact opposite.

“She has massively broken the girl code and she doesn’t even have any remorse about it.”

Londoner Danielle met Chris in 2011 when he was at Bolton Wanderers. A year later she gave up a top marketing job with Marie Claire magazine to move into his £3.5million mansion.

Psychology graduate Danielle told a pal: “At first it was wonderful. He was the life and soul of the party, he would light up the room.

“He was funny and charismatic. He knew how to make me laugh and had great banter — he was just good fun to be around.

“I thought I was with him for life. I sacrificed my career, gave up the most important years of my life for him. I now realise I became dependant on him. I had no friends in the North.”

After she had their first daughter, who is now four, Chris proposed and Danielle planned their wedding for 2017 at Peckforton Castle in Cheshire — where Jamie and Becky Vardy tied the knot.

But when she fell pregnant with their second daughter, who is now three, the wedding was postponed.

Despite Danielle’s fears she had become dependant on Eagles, she finally made friends after joining mother and baby groups.

Then last year Danielle found a new friend in Jennifer, who plays Mercedes McQueen in Channel 4 soap Hollyoaks.

At the time Jennifer was with Geordie Shore’s Greg Lake, 36. They were together for eight years and have a three-year-old son.

Danielle told the pal: “We met through a mutual friend and hit it off straight away as our kids are the same age.

“We chatted about going to personal training sessions together. And she came round last summer for drinks in the garden, around the time she split from Greg.

“She got on with Chris too. It was just my fiance and our friend having a good time, that was all I thought it was. I had no suspicions that they might fancy each other.”

So when Danielle was told in September that Chris and Jennifer had been seen having dinner together she thought nothing of it.

'BAD PLACE'

Danielle told the friend: “Four separate people text me about it. I was like, ‘No, it’s nothing, I’m friends with Jen’.

“One of the girls who messaged me was like, ‘Babe, I’m really sorry, I don’t want to rub salt in your wounds, but this looks a little bit more than them just bumping into each other’.

“Jen found out I’d been told and she rang me, saying, ‘Babe, I wouldn’t do that to you. I’m real, I’d tell you. Chris isn’t my type’. I believed her. We laughed about it.”

Danielle was getting a train to London the following month when she bumped into Jennifer on the platform and they sat next to each other.

Danielle said: “I really opened up to her about my relationship.

“I said, ‘I’m in a really bad place, I don’t know where I am with Chris, I just don’t think it’s working’.

“She started talking about the single life and finding yourself again. She said, ‘You just need to leave him and you’ll be fine.’

“At the time I really appreciated it, I thought she had given me the friendly push I needed. But now I look back, I’m like, ‘Wow!’.”

Danielle left Chris days later and moved out of the family home in Bowdon, Cheshire, into a flat nearby. Weeks later she realised she had been “betrayed” by Jennifer.

She told a pal: “The first weekend of December Chris said he couldn’t have the kids because he was going for a meeting in the Lake District.

“Then Jen posted a picture of herself on Instagram on the top of a hill in the Lake District. I knew. You just know.

“Even when it’s not fully black and white, you just know.

“Then a friend rang me and said, ‘Chris has just been bragging about how he was dating someone called Jen’. She didn’t know who ‘Jen’ was. Obviously, I knew.”

Days later Danielle heard the pair were together at Jennifer’s home in Manchester. Danielle said: “I was so angry. I had to speak to her.

“She was just so cold on the phone. Absolutely placid. She said, ‘I owe you nothing. I don’t regret anything I’ve done’. It’s the lack of remorse. There has been no apology.”

Danielle was working as a patient liaison manager for a plastic surgeon at a hospital but work has dropped off with lockdown.

She told the pal: “I’m determined to get full-time work so I can look after my kids. I want them to respect me. That is an important thing to me. Loyalty and respect.

“That is why what Jen has done upsets me so much.

“Within a few months she went from being my new friend to being in my old house with my ex- fiance. It has definitely put me off trusting new people.”

Danielle refused to comment when approached by The Sun on Sunday.