Partial court win for Vardy

Rebekah Vardy has scored a partial victory in the latest stage of her libel battle after a High Court judge threw out parts of Coleen Rooney’s defence.

Mrs Rooney, 35, accused Mrs Vardy, 39, of leaking “false stories” about her private life in October 2019 after carrying out a months-long “sting operation” which saw her dubbed “Wagatha Christie”.

Mrs Vardy, who is married to Leicester City striker Jamie Vardy, denies the accusations and is suing Mrs Rooney for libel. At a hearing in June, Mrs Vardy’s lawyers asked the High Court to throw out parts of Mrs Rooney’s defence as they were “irrelevant or peripheral” to the case.

This included allegations of Mrs Vardy’s close relationship with The Sun and her alleged but denied authorship of “The Secret Wag” column.

In a judgment delivered yesterday, Mrs Justice Steyn threw out parts of Mrs Rooney’s defence but kept some aspects that Mrs Vardy had applied to strike out.

The judge dismissed a claim by Mrs Rooney that her fellow footballer’s wife showed “publicity-seeking behaviour” when sitting behind Mrs Rooney in someone else’s seat at the 2016 Euros.

Mrs Justice Steyn found even assuming the allegation was true, it would still not help Mrs Rooney’s case.

She said: “The fact that a person seeks media coverage of their own attendance at a football match does not make it more probable that they would disclose private information about another person to the press.”

The judge said the argument was irrelevant, adding “it would be a waste of time and resources” for the claim to continue.

Mrs Justice Steyn also threw out an allegation that Mrs Vardy was leaking about the libel case itself to The Sun.

The judge further dismissed part of Mrs Rooney’s defence about how Mrs Vardy had written a statement for the press regulator IPSO after a complaint was made about The Sun.

However, Mrs Justice Steyn said the alleged close relationship between Mrs Vardy and the newspaper was “one of the building blocks” of Mrs Rooney’s inferential case.

Mrs Vardy’s lawyers previously told the court that her alleged – but denied – authorship of “The Secret Wag” column, was not relevant to the trial.

Mrs Justice Steyn found the short-lived column was relevant to the case. The judge also refused to throw out other parts of Mrs Rooney’s defence about Mrs Vardy’s alleged close relationship with The Sun and its journalists.

LIBEL BATTLE: Coleen Rooney, left, and Rebekah Vardy, right.