Rebekah Vardy – live: Coleen Rooney’s triumphant messages to friends after ‘Wagatha Christie’ reveal post

Hugh Tomlinson QC described the arguments that Ms Vardy had a “conspiracy to delete” messages or had deleted some in a selective way as an “incredible theory”.

“There was an export of a very large number of Whatsapp messages,” he told the court.

“Why would Mrs Vardy, if she was destroying evidence, do it in that selective and complex way?” Mr Tomlinson asked.

“If she was a wicked litigant who was trying to deceive the court by getting rid of damaging evidence, the idea she would do it by getting rid of images and not text .... simply beggars belief.”

Earlier Hugh Tomlinson QC had said: “People have different views, people behave in different ways. Mrs Rooney thought Mrs Vardy was suspiciously friendly, but people behave in different ways.”

Later, discussing The Sun newspaper and Ms Rooney, the barrister said it was “a newspaper that she clearly loathes” and that Ms Rooney may disapprove of the way Ms Vardy had sometimes been featured in it.

“One can see why Mrs Rooney thinks that but it is not a basis for making an allegation of the kind that was made,” Mr Tomlinson said.

Mr Tomlinson added: “Mrs Vardy has made mistakes. Perhaps the most serious of these may have been to trust Ms Watt as her agent.”

Mr Tomlinson is taking the court through messages between Ms Vardy and her agent, where the pair discuss how Ms Rooney’s private information is being leaked to the press and speculate about who is doing it.

Mr Tomlinson has argued that, because the pair are wondering who the leak might be, it cannot be them.

In one exchange on 16 August 2019 Ms Watt messaged: “So I asked Andy Halls a couple of days ago where they are getting so much coleen stuff from and he wouldn’t say who.” Andy Halls is a Sun journalist.

She added: “I think she has posted that to see if anyone sells it x,” to which Ms Vardy replied: “I wonder who it’s coming from then x”.

Ms Vardy also messaged: “Yeah 100% these posts are to see who gives them to the paper x.”

In another exchange, Ms Vardy messaged her agent about whether she was suspected by Ms Rooney as a leak.

“Do you think she still thinks it’s me x,” she wrote.

Ms Watt, referring to Sun reporters, replied: “That’s why I asked him who he got stuff from. And that’s when he said Ellie henman gets it all but sometimes they put it under his byline to make it less obvious.”

“Bet it’s their PR again has to be x”, Ms Vardy replied. “I really can’t see anyone being that arses with selling stories on her.”

“Unless it is someone who is skint like Danielle Lloyd,” Ms Watt responded.

“Ahhh is she on her private Instagram x,” Ms Vardy questioned.

“Yes! I saw her comment on something the other day. In fact it was under a story she had posted a screenshot of x.”

Mr Tomlinson has said that the Whatsapp exchanges between Ms Vardy and Ms Watt are “crucial” to the case, but accused Mr Sherborne of focusing on the ones which aid his case.

“One of the remarkable features of Mr Sherborne’s cross examination… was that he studiously avoided all the Whatsapp messages which suggest that neither Ms Vardy or Ms Watt are the source of the stories… where they discuss stories and say ‘i wonder who leaked that?’”, Mr Tomlinson said.

“He studiously avoided the messages that pointed in the opposite direction,” he added.

Mr Tomlinson is questioning why Ms Vardy would want to delete the media her Whatsapp exchange with Ms Watt, as Ms Rooney’s side has suggested. He says that the idea that she would selectively delete things was “remarkable”.

“If you want to get rid of Whatsapp messages, get rid of them all,” he said. He asked why, if Ms Vardy was deliberately deleting messages, she has disclosed “a whole series of outrageous comments” to the court.

“Ms Vardy certainly does not want to be court,” Mr Tomlinson added.

“All she wants is to be vindicated that she was not the person who leaked Ms Rooney’s private information to the Sun.”

He maintained: “This is a case about Mrs Vardy and the way that she has been treated by thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of people on social media... She has continued to receive abuse to this day, even through the trial.”

Ms Vardy’s lawyer Hugh Tomlinson QC has said that “to this day” his client “does not know what happened.”

“What we say about this case is that really in essence it really it is a very simple case”, he said as he began his closing statement. He explained that he believes the case rests on whether Ms Rooney has proved that Ms Vardy leaked information from the Instagram stories as Ms Rooney had accused her of doing.

He accused Ms Rooney’s lawyers of furthering “conspiracy theories” about the alleged deletion of evidence.

Speaking about Ms Vardy, Mr Tomlinson said: “She does not know to this day what happened, she does not know where this information came from... It is possible, as she now accepts, that the source of the leak could well be Caroline Watt.”

“Mrs Vardy has obviously made mistakes. One of the mistakes that she made.. is that she trusted someone she shouldn’t have trusted,” said Mr Tomlinson, referring to Ms Watt.

Read the highlights from Day Six of the trial on Tuesday:

Wayne Rooney told the High Court that he had an “awkward” conversation with Jamie Vardy to get his wife to “calm down” her media activities during Euro 2016 at the request of the England manager.

The former England international said that then-England manager Roy Hogson and assistant manager Gary Neville asked him, as captain of the team, “to speak to my team mate Jamie Vardy about the fact that Becky’s media activities were causing problems and distractions” during the tournament.

David Sherborne later argued it would be “nonsensical” for Rebekah Vardy to ask her agent to leak information about footballer Riyad Mahrez not going to training if it was publicly known as she claimed.

He said. “It would be nonsensical for Mrs Vardy to (indicate) to Caroline Watt to pass on information to journalists if it was already public knowledge.”

David Sherborne alleged there were “numerous examples” of Rebekah Vardy and Caroline Watt “conspiring to, and indeed, passing private and personal information to the press about other individuals”. He claimed this showed Ms Vardy’s “propensity” and “willingness” to “leak information”.

Mr Sherborne said the “clear inference” was Ms Vardy’s “willingness to leak information about other people in the same way that she was willing to leak information about Mrs Rooney”. “The fact that this is all understood and followed by Mrs Vardy demonstrated her knowledge and complicity in a way in which no one can explain away, however silver tongued,” Mr Sherborne said.

In case you missed it...

Wayne and Coleey Rooney have missed the final day of the Wagatha Christie trial to go on a trip with their children, their lawyer has said.

The High Court met on Thursday to hear the closing statements in the libel battle between Ms Rooney and Rebekah Vardy.

But while Ms Vardy turned up for the trial, neither Ms Rooney nor her husband - who has watched every other day at the court and took the stand on Tuesday - were present.

Read the full story here:

Ms Vardy’s agent Caroline Watt’s withdrawal of her witness evidence suggests that she was the source of the leaks of Ms Rooney’s private information, Mr Sherborne has argued.

Ms Watt’s withdrawal of her waiver indicates she was the source of the leaks, Ms Rooney’s legal team also argued.

In a submission to the court, he wrote: “The only explanation for the withdrawal of her source waiver – after having initially waived it because she believed that the journalists would say that she was not the source of the stories - is that Ms Watt was the source, and realised that The Sun would not keep secret such documents showing such leaks. There was no other reason to withdraw the waiver, especially as she did not need to do this just because she was no longer giving evidence.

“Similarly, Ms Watt did not need to withdraw her witness evidence (unless it was to assist the Claimant in anticipation of her use as a scapegoat) as there had been no order she would be cross-examined”

Ms Rooney’s lawyer David Sherborne has concluded his closing speech and the court has risen for lunch.

After the break, Ms Vardy’s lawyer Mr Hugh Tomlinson QC will give his submissions.

Coleen Rooney’s barrister has told the High Court the libel claim brought against her by Rebekah Vardy is “extraordinary”.

Outlining Ms Rooney’s case in a written closing statement, David Sherborne said: “In many respects this trial has been extraordinary.

“Extraordinary because of the tenacity of the claimant in backtracking on her admissions of leaks. Extraordinary because of the documentary evidence that flatly contradicts the claimant’s account, as well as the extent to which it plainly demonstrates her consistent practice of secretly leaking information to the press.

“Extraordinary because of the claimant’s failure to ever advance a positive case as to how else the information was leaked, if not via the route identified by the defendant.

“Extraordinary for the determination of the claimant to frustrate the defendant’s efforts to uncover the truth, through the destruction of critical evidence, with yet further destruction being uncovered (only through the defendant’s efforts) even in the weeks before this trial that can only have occurred from deliberate manual deletions.

“And extraordinary because of the absence of the central figure - Caroline Watt, the claimant’s close friend, agent, conduit. Hamlet without the Prince of Denmark.”