Heather breaks rules for love

Heather Watson has emerged as the secret weapon behind high-flying Yeovil Town’s Football League bid.

Watson, 27, has been dating top Yeovil striker Courtney Duffus since last Wimbledon.

Irishman Duffus, 24, scored a hat-trick in a 6-2 National League win over Torquay on Boxing Day when his tennis girlfriend watched at Huish Park, reports The Sun.

Duffus, an ex-Everton trainee, is the club’s leading scorer with 12 goals as Yeovil target an immediate return to League Two.

The British No.2 laughed: “Since we both met each other we’re both doing a lot better!

“He had a big part to play. He’s super positive. I don’t like to let boys have too much influence over me but he has really been a good

influence. He’s so calm, level-headed. You all know I’m quite emotional. And he’s just really, really supportive. He gets up at all hours of the night, he watched all my matches in Hobart. It’s him as a character. It’s not just because he plays sports. That helps but I know there are sportspeople that don’t understand as well,” he continued.

The pair met the weekend of the 2019 Wimbledon finals and have quickly fallen in love — even though Watson refused at first to date a footballer.

The World No.75 said: “I went out to dinner with friend Naomi Broady. You know at a restaurant when you book the table and they say: ‘Oh can you wait at the bar?’ It was there where we met.

“The first thing they did was buy us shots. It was good fun. I found that out later in the night he was a footballer so I was like: ‘For sure, I’m not going to date him.’ I don’t really follow football. I’ve learned footballers don’t train nearly as much as we do. It’s a good life.

“And I’ve learned that there’s a lot of politics in football, lots of factors that go into everything and it’s really complicated.

“You just think of it as a team against a team but there are lot of different things,” he added.