DIALLING the number, I steeled myself for a conversation I really didn’t want to have. A woman with an American accent answered. I introduced myself, then asked her why her number had appeared several times on our phone bill.
“Oh, your husband is in love with me,” she said, almost matter-of-factly. “He doesn’t want to be with you any more.”
Prime Video series Married To The Game depicts the ups and downs of life with a footballer, Suzi Walker, 52, ex-wife of England goalkeeper Ian, shares her unvarnished accountCredit: Oliver Dixon
Suzi out with footballer Ian in 1995Credit: Richard Chambury/Alpha
In that moment, my whole world collapsed. Although it confirmed what I had long suspected,
I was devastated and I couldn’t stop crying. I felt sick from the moment I woke up to the moment I went to sleep. I didn’t want to live.
While being the wife of a famous footballer might look like it’s all designer handbags, expensive holidays and luxury houses, behind the glossy exterior, there often lies a much darker truth.
As Kyle Walker’s wife Annie is now discovering – and something that’s touched upon in Prime Video’s new series Married To The Game – life as a WAG can be a lonely reality. Betrayal and deceit are rife and you are left torn apart by insecurity. Believe me, I know.
When I was married to former England and Tottenham Hotspur footballer Ian Walker, 52, I’d regularly have to watch women flirting with him right in front of me. It was as if I didn’t exist.
‘Girls on a mission for footballers’
Knowing he was facing temptation at every turn made me constantly paranoid and suspicious.
During the 13 years we were married, there was no shortage of women waiting to step into my shoes.
Some girls would go out on a mission looking for players, targeting the nightclubs where they knew they were partying, then making it clear that they were “available”.
The guys would have a few drinks and, well, some men just can’t help themselves.
It was a toxic existence and it would eventually break my heart when Ian’s affair with a woman he met in Las Vegas – the one on the end of the phone – came to light in 2006.
Ian and I first met on a blind date, set up by [former fellow Tottenham player] Jason Cundy and his then-wife Lizzie.
It was 1992 and Ian was an up-and-coming goalie for Spurs and I was a 19-year-old model with no interest in football.
I felt huge pressure to look a certain way, because of the female attention he got
We arranged to meet at Deals restaurant in London, and I fancied him immediately. We hit it off and became inseparable.
Within eight months of our first date, Ian had become a star on and off the pitch. This was the early ’90s when the new Premier League was turning footballers into celebrities.
There was more money than ever and players were being treated like gods.
With football and now fame, there was certainly less time for me and he wasn’t as attentive as he used to be. Still, when Ian proposed in Barbados the following year, I said: “Yes”, and we married in Weybridge Registry Office in 1994.
That was when our problems really started. Doubts would bubble in the back of my mind. Ian would often go clubbing for 24 hours after matches. I wouldn’t know where he was and couldn’t get hold of him.
‘Not known as a womaniser’
I remember one night not long after we’d married, we were out at Faces nightclub in Essex. I stepped away from the table to get a drink, and by the time I returned another woman had plonked herself down in my seat next to Ian.
When things like this happened we’d inevitably argue. Occasionally, I’d try to make Ian jealous by flirting with other guys, which only caused more rows.
Sometimes I’d confront the women, but often they were just rude and drunk.
Ian wasn’t known as one of football’s womanisers, and he genuinely seemed to like being in a settled relationship – so much so that I told myself he’d never cheat.
Nevertheless, because of the female attention, I felt a huge amount of pressure to look a certain way. I worked hard to keep a good figure, I got my hair done regularly and kept up with the latest fashion.
As the wife of a footballer, you feel you have to keep on top of your game, and that can be exhausting.
Having our daughter Sophie in 1998 brought us closer as a couple. Early parenthood was actually the best part of our time together and we did genuinely love each other.
But being thrown into the limelight and dealing with the pressure of fame made it hard.
Football was always going to be Ian’s priority, and it would both influence his mood and impact the state of our marriage.
On a Friday night before a game, he’d be stressed and snappy and I’d feel like I was walking on eggshells. If they lost, he’d be in a bad temper at home. And if they won, he’d be out celebrating with the boys.
Annie Kilner has remained so dignified in the face of public heartache.
The writing was probably on the wall for us when Ian was transferred to Bolton Wanderers in 2005. He rented a flat up there, while I stayed with Sophie, then seven, in the family home in Surrey. That was a mistake.
When he returned home from a week-long boys’ trip to Las Vegas in 2006, I sensed something was wrong.
He couldn’t look me in the eye. He denied it, but when you’ve been married to someone all those years, you know these things.
After several weeks, he told me: “I can’t do this any more.” I then discovered the number on a phone bill, which led to the call that destroyed me.
Shortly afterwards, my parents moved into the family home with me and Sophie, as I wasn’t coping and needed their support.
Our divorce was finalised in 2008, but looking back, I don’t know how we lasted as long as we did.
We were so young and naive when we met, and when Ian was thrown into the spotlight things became difficult. After the move to Bolton, we just drifted apart.
Compounding the hurt was the fact that many of the people I thought I could count on dropped me like a stone.
I’d made friends at Bolton Wanderers, but afterwards some of them wouldn’t even take my calls. It was really painful and so upsetting.
When your story is in the spotlight, it leaves you feeling inadequate, like you’re not good enough, which is why my heart goes out to Annie Kilner, who split from husband Kyle after it was revealed he’d cheated on her.
With three children and another one on the way, she’s somehow managed to remain composed and dignified in the face of such public heartache, and I think she’s amazing.
It’s been nearly 18 years since Ian and I split and I don’t have any bitterness towards him.
We’ve both changed – I went on to have another daughter, Cameron, in 2008 [during an eight-year relationship with Simon Jordan, former owner of Crystal Palace] and got married again in 2018 to businessman Mark Pitman.
‘Pain of being so publicly betrayed’
After splitting from the woman he met in Las Vegas, Ian seems happy in his new relationship and works as a coach in China. He’s a great dad to Sophie and there are no bad feelings between us.
I’m not saying all footballers are the same, but when Cameron recently said she’d been asked on a date by a young player, I was concerned.
If she’d said she was meeting a lawyer or a doctor, I’d have felt better. She went anyway, of course. But it got me thinking: if I lived my life again, would I have rather married a doctor? Maybe, yes.
There was a time when all I wanted was the newest watch or bag, but now I realise what’s important. There is nothing better than feeling content and safe in a relationship.
I still hold some wonderful memories from my marriage with Ian, but no amount of money could compensate for the years of vulnerability and second-guessing.
Also, absolutely nothing is worth the pain of being so publicly betrayed.
Suzi married businessman Mark Pitman in 2018
Tottenham Hotspur goalkeeper Ian Walker in action in 1997Credit: Stu Forster/Allsport
