Family of Vinnie Jones's new partner 'Blondie' Emma Ford break silence on their ... trends now
The family of Vinnie Jones’s 'lovely' new partner are ‘so happy’ she has found love with the former football hardman.
The 59-year-old star fell for Emma Ford while filming his TV show Vinnie Jones In The Country.
It comes five years after the tragic death of his wife Tanya from cancer and Vinnie's fears he was so heartbroken that he'd never find love again.
Back home in Bridgwater, Somerset, where Emma, 47, grew up, family members wished the couple a lifetime of happiness - and are glad she is 'settling down' after years of jetsetting.
Her uncle David Ford told MailOnline: ‘Emma is such a lovely girl, really nice and kind. I am glad she is settling down. It’s amazing news.
'I’ve never poked my nose in but when I saw him doing his show on the farm and she was in the background we knew they were an item. The whole family wishes them a lifetime of happiness.’
Mr Ford added: ‘She goes all over the world with him. She lives between here and America while I’m a man who lives in sunny Somerset so we don’t see that much of her'.
Vinnie has said he is in a 'fantastic' relationship with Emma, who he affectionately calls 'Blondie' and is a former TV reporter, DJ and event manager who like him has also given up alcohol.
Vinnie Jones has hailed 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
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 former Wimbledon footballer, 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'.
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. '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.'
Emma Ford was a racy model and star of noughties lads channel Men & Motors - where Vinnie Jones also made his broadcasting breakthrough.
Taunton-born Ms Ford, 47, who the 59-year-old footballer turned actor affectionately calls 'Blondie', had her own programme, 'Emma's A-Z Of American Sex', and was also a team captain on the gameshow 'A Question of Sex' in 2003.
She was also an actress and model, including in a magazine advert for fashion brand Urban Stone, which at the time was branded the raunchiest of all time with pictures taken by erotic photographer Bob Carlos Clarke, who regarded her as his 'muse'.
Vinnie, who has said he is in a 'fantastic' relationship with Emma, helped launch Men & Motors in 1996. He also presented The Vinnie Jones Show, often from a pub or bar, interviewing a host of celebrities and sports people including Jack Charlton, Robbie Savage, Eric Bristow, Damon Hill and Peter Stringfellow in 1997.
But a year later his career exploded after his star performance in Guy Richie's Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels.
