Vinnie Jones' friends reveal his new partner 'Blondie' has 'brought the light back into his eyes' as football's reformed hardman finds love with loyal PA who bossed him about in his Discovery+ farm series - five years after death of his wife
Vinnie Jones' friends have revealed his new partner has 'brought the light back into his eyes', as football's reformed hardman has found love with the loyal PA who bossed him about in his Discovery+ farm series five years after the death of his wife.
Pals are said to have been left 'thrilled' after the 59-year-old got together with Emma Ford, who he affectionately calls 'Blondie'.
A former TV reporter, DJ and event manager, who like him has also given up alcohol - pals say that the pair are a great match who saw their relationship blossom from a friendship developed while working together.
It comes half a decade after the footballer feared he would never be happy again following the death of his wife Tanya in 2019.
'Vinnie and Emma's relationship was very organic and started as purely a working friendship before it developed into something more,' a source told The Sun.
'Emma has brought the light back into Vinnie's eyes and she clearly makes him very happy.
Vinnie and Emma, who is praised by viewers for her patience with her boss on his farm
Emma Ford working for Men and Motors as a presenter in 2003
Vinnie Jones has found his fantastic new girlfriend Emma Ford - who also starred in his Discovery+ show Vinnie Jones: In the Country (pictured together)
Tanya died at their home in Los Angeles six years after being diagnosed with skin cancer in 2013
'They are a great match and everyone who knows them was thrilled when they became a couple.'
Vinnie, who has returned to acting as the star of Netflix's The Gentleman, has spoken of how Emma has 'calmed' him down after years of hard drinking and depression left him 'rotting inside'.
The source added that the couple are not rushing into anything, but enjoying the relationship as they take it day by day.
He has admitted that he will never get over the death of his wife Tanya, 53, in 2019 at their LA home following a six-year battle with skin cancer.
But he said that his new partner and happiness shows that a 'flower can grow and and bloom' from the darkest of times.
He said: 'Moving forwards, we meet other people that we are fond of and we fall in love with and vice versa. Maybe she's calmed me down a little bit. Maybe she brings a different perspective to it all for me.'
Emma, a former PA to Mick Jones from The Clash who also worked as a showbiz reporter on Hollywood red carpets, had returned to the UK after years spent working and partying hard in LA.
The new couple were brought together by the pandemic and Vinnie's farm in West Sussex - and she also became a star of the documentary series about his new rural life that aired on Discovery+ last November.
Ms Ford, loved by viewers of Vinnie Jones in the Country as his patient and charming PA with a neat blonde pixie hair cut, has also quit drinking.
Emma is a former TV reporter (pictured interviewing Kevin Costner) who became PA to Vinnie. She was previously a PA to Mick Jones from The Clash
Vinnie has spoken openly about his battle with grief following Tanya's death. He said at the time of her death: 'I will never be with anyone else' and never love again
The footballer-turned-actor is starring in in Netflix's The Gentleman alongside Joely Richardson - pictured together. It aired this month
Speaking to the Mirror, he admitted he had found love again with Emma. It is happy news for Vinnie who said in 2019: 'I will never be with anyone else'.
'You know, after four months, four years, five years, 10 years, you just keep moving forwards, the grief is always going to be in there', the star of Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels said.
But he added: 'It's how other things can control it. It's how much the flower can grow and and bloom. I think, for me, grief was always black and grey, but it doesn't have to be. It can be colours and happy memories'.
Emma has worked for the former Wimbledon footballer and was often shown being a voice of reason the show on Vinnie Jones in the Country.
One minute she was shown helping him doing the paperwork for his new Bentley - and the next intervening to help has her boss managed construction projects.
But rumours of their romance began when they were seen with Vinnie's family enjoying a pub lunch just after Christmas this year.
It marks a new happy chapter for Vinnie, after the great tragedy of losing Tanya to cancer.
In an interview in 2019, which moved him and others to tears, he said: 'She was the light of my life. I will never be with anyone else. I'm a shell. She is the only one... whenever I let myself down, or her down, she was always the strongest, the person who I answered to.
'She wouldn't give me her blessing to meet someone else – I just know her. I can't see it happening, I might have friends or whatever, I would be astonished if that happens.
'I think I've only got a little way to go until I'm with her, in the spectrum of the universe.'
Vinnie arrives for a family lunch at a pub - with Emma behind him to the left in the background in January - before their relationship became public
Jones released personal memoir on his grief following the death of his beloved partner
Tanya's health problems began when her heart had struggled while giving birth to her daughter at age 21.
She was saved after being given a heart transplant, using the heart of a 14-year-old German boy. She later went on to become one of the longest-surviving heart recipients.
Tragically it was cancer that ultimately killed Tanya. She had discovered her cancer had returned and spread to her brain in a phone call on Christmas Eve while the couple were celebrating with 15 family members in Palm Springs in 2018.
Jones said it was the moment they realised 'it's beat us' but Tanya had been determined to have 'the best Christmas ever' so kept it a secret from everyone.
'The bravery of her is unfathomable,' Jones added. 'All's she wanted to do was please people.'
She died aged 53 in their Hollywood home on July 6 2019 following a six-year battle with cancer.
At around midnight on the night Tanya died, Jones was sitting outside in the darkness, and he said: 'We always had this thing, Tans and I - when I was away I'd throw her a kiss and she'd catch it.
'There was a star, very close and not very high. So I said: 'Is that you, babe?' Nothing. I went inside but thought... 'I didn't throw the kiss'. So I went back out, threw the kiss and the light went whoosh!' I swear that happened.'
Since her death Vinnie Jones - who is now 11 years sober - has been open about his grief and become a mental health advocate.
'Losing Tanya has been the worst thing that's ever happened to me and her family and friends, but I don't want her loss to be in vain', he said previously. Pictured: The couple in 2002
Jones was known for his bad behaviour on and off the pitch. Pictured: Jones grabbing Paul Gascoigne's crotch during clash between Wimbledon and Newcastle United on February 6 1988
From the pitch to Lock Stock and Guy Ritchie's leading man: Vinnie Jones started his life as a footballer before ditching his boots for a life in Hollywood. Pictured: Jones starring in Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels in 1998
Commissioned by Netflix, The Gentleman is a spin-off of the 2019 Guy Ritchie film of the same name, and will also be directed by the star
Jones has encouraged others to go sober, branding alcohol 'the worst drug on the planet' and telling the sober-curious 'if I can quit, believe me; you can and your life will be a million per cent better. I guarantee it.'
Speaking about his addiction earlier this month, he told GQ: 'I was a party alcoholic. I'd do it to be a laugh – it was like inviting the f***ing court jester. I'd be really funny and then there was a point where it levelled and came back the other way. I don't think alcohol was my hook, I think it was the sugar.
'The sugar got me to a f***ing place, but once the alcohol kicked in, I was kind of paranoid. I was very defensive if someone was negative towards me.'
Opening up on the loss of his wife, Jones said he remained 'broken' inside and 'struggles to comprehend' going to bed on his own.
He copes with his grief by throwing himself into work and seeking help from a psychologist in a bid to stop him 'drowning' in his own despair.
The star has also become the latest champion for the farming industry, starring in a new documentary Vinnie Jones: In the Country
'[Grief] is a ghost, it's a blanket. It wraps around you and it pulls you down. You don't know when it's going to happen, why it happens. It just happens,' he told Stuff.
'You've got to try and get your head above water, breathe in as long as you can because you know you're going to be pulled under again.
'You got to give people what they want, or you f*****g drown. It's f*****g exhausting [Sometimes I want to] build a 50 foot wall around to keep everybody out and keep me in...
'My spirit may be broken inside, but I think I've got enough knowledge and enough experience to cope with it.'
The actor previously wrote a book about his experiences , Lost Without You: Loving And Losing Tanya.
'Losing Tanya has been the worst thing that's ever happened to me and her family and friends, but I don't want her loss to be in vain', he said previously.
Once football's most notorious hardman, famous for grabbing Paul Gascoigne by the genitals, he reinvented himself as and actor and swapped the football pitch for a life in Hollywood to play bad guys and thugs on the silver screen.
Adding another string to his bow, Jones has also become the latest champion for the farming industry, starring in a new documentary series dubbed the 'next Clarkson's Farm'. Vinnie Jones: In the Country follows his new life on a sprawling 147-acre plot on a farm in Petworth, West Sussex.
Yesterday it was reported that the footballer-turned-actor was offered big bucks to star on the latest production of the Only Fools and Horses musical on the West End.
The lucrative offer comes after Jones received 'rave reviews across the board' for his role in Netflix's The Gentleman.
But three decades ago, the thought of the former Chelsea star singing and dancing on stage in front of a crowd of people would have been laughed off as a ludicrous suggestion.
