Man United star saw me on FHM cover – I rejected his approaches via text with blunt reply

Tanya Bardsley didn't have the smoothest start to life with ex-Manchester United star Phil Bardsley, as their relationship began like the clumsy punch he famously landed on Wayne Rooney.

Their love life kicked off with a rejection sparked by a blunt seven-word text message that Tanya couldn't resist sending. At the time, she was gracing the pages of the legendary lad mag FHM and had just been featured on its cover.

On the other side was Bardsley, a hopeful talent at United, fuelled by aspirations of securing a first-team position and winning over a glamour model.

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Eager to make an impression on Tanya – who summed up early noughties glamour – Bardsley managed to get hold of her number and sent what he believed would be a winning introductory text. Phil's text read: "I'm Phil, I play for Man U," – a message that, in terms of old-fashioned and modern flirting, wasn't exactly groundbreaking.

Clearly unimpressed, Tanya's short and swift reply was: "Never heard of you."

This would be the end of the possibility of romance for many, but Bardsley continued with the tenacity he tended to display on the field. It took three years, and presumably some improved pick-up lines, before Tanya finally agreed to meet him, though it was during a night out she had already planned with friends.

"I was going to a club with my friends and told him to just come there," Tanya recalled. Fast-forward to the present, and the couple, who exchanged vows in 2014, have established a life together, complete with children, cars and valuable financial wisdom.

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