Ashley Cole and Cheryl were one of the biggest celebrity power couples until his cheating ways were finally exposed.
Their troubled marriage started to unravel when details of his sordid affairs with at least half a dozen women began to emerge.
Having met while living in the same block of London flats, the former Chelsea defender married the Girls Aloud singer in a lavish ceremony in Hertfordshire in July 2006.
It seemed like a loving relationship from the outside, with Cheryl even getting 'Mrs C' tattooed on her neck.
The couple's marriage was rocked by speculation about Ashley's infidelity in January 2008 when a blonde hairdresser claimed they had sex after a boozy night clubbing.
"Please don't tell anyone or I'll get in trouble," Cole reportedly begged Aimee Walton, who went back to her friend's flat with the footballer.
Aimee said that Cole had assured her that Cheryl "knows what I do" - but still pleaded with her to not tell anyone about what happened.
The sordid details of their night of passion were exposed, including how Ashley had been sick during sex.
"We started having sex then he just rolled over and vomited on the floor all over the cream carpet, it was disgusting," explained Aimee.
But that wasn't enough to stop the pair from carrying on, with Cole washing his mouth out before hopping back into bed with Aimee.
The hairdresser added: "He had some mouthwash then jumped back into bed. We started having sex again but his mates piled into the room.
"After they left we finally managed to get going again and tried several positions. Eventually he finished and collapsed. He was panting and clearly had a good time."
Guilt-ridden Aimee confessed it was a "big mistake" which she sincerely regretted.
"I had drunk too much and went along with what he wanted," she explained.
"I feel so sorry for Cheryl but she should know what he's like."
But Cheryl chose to ignore the allegations made against her husband and came out to support Ashley in an interview a week later.
With Cole at her side, Cheryl said: "Ashley’s a wonderful husband and we ARE in love. I know Ashley intimately. When he’s under the influence he isn’t capable."
However, that very same day, glamour model, Brooke Healy claimed she'd had sex with Ashley in December 2006.
She also alleged she was then given thousand of pounds of cash by one of his friends and told to sign a legal document stating she did not sleep with him.
"I didn't feel right about the situation, but what could I do? The majority of London's West End scene knows about Ashley and they know what he gets up to and that he's not faithful to Cheryl," Brooke told the Sunday Mirror.
"I feel bad for her because she married somebody who isn't faithful."
Their troubled marriage became the focus of much media attention and Cheryl was pictured on a number of occasions without her wedding ring, including in her role as a new X Factor judge.
But they decided to give their marriage another go and by September Cheryl was wearing her wedding and engagement rings permanently.
In January 2009, Cheryl told Vogue she was giving Ashley another chance.
She explained: "Look, Ashley's young, and he's got a young mentality for his age anyway. He's learning. He has a beautiful soul and he's a really nice guy."
Then Cheryl's worst fears were realised when four more women came forward in January 2010.
American civil servant Ann Corbitt told how she slept with Ashley in Seattle as Chelsea toured the US.
Ann claimed Ashley went to desperate lengths to hide their fling, even using an unsuspecting Chelsea club official to help his cover-up.
"Ashley was calling me all day, almost every night, three, four, five times a night," she said.
"He would beg me not to tell anyone what happened, then repeat, ‘If you don’t say anything, the newspaper has nothing’.”
He also sent lewd pictures of himself to glamour model Sonia Wild and then claimed the snaps had been sent by a friend.
Devastated Cheryl flew back from the US to confront the love rat, who had already fled their house, over the string of women claiming to have slept with him.
Despite initially thinking the women were lying, the details they gave were ones she said, "nobody could have known, and nobody should have known except me".
"One girl said they drank rosé wine in a hotel bedroom together, and that Ashley smoked," Cheryl wrote in her 2012 autobiography, My Story by Cheryl Cole.
"He does like rosé wine, and at first I told myself she could have seen him drinking it in the bar rather than sharing a bottle with him in the bedroom.
"The smoking, though? He’s a footballer and this wasn’t something he did in public. Hardly
anybody knew he smoked."
Details about the sex itself stung the most, with Cheryl revealing claims about 'hand holding in bed' tore her heart out.
"That hit a nerve, a big one. That was my husband that someone else was talking about," she continued.
"The description 'like relationship sex' was so painful to read I blocked it out totally; I couldn’t deal with it.
"I pushed the papers away, feeling sick at the smell of the newsprint, and then I actually vomited."
"When I put the phone down I sobbed hysterically, like a little child does, crying so hard I was gasping for air and wanting to be sick," she wrote.
When she finally confronted Cole he told her he was too drunk to remember the night in question.
After finding out about the Chelsea and England star’s love trysts elsewhere she screamed at him: “I hope she’s worth it. It’s the end of your marriage. It’s f***ed.”
Ashley came round to collect some things but it was Cheryl who comforted him, claiming he "clung to me like a little boy."
Shortly afterwards in February 2010, Cheryl announced that the pair were separating.
Worried Cheryl realised she had to get checked for sexually transmitted diseases after discovering her husband had been sleeping around.
"I had to face the fact that Ashley’s infidelity had been putting me at risk for a long time, and I had to put my mind at rest," she wrote.
"I was given the all clear, but my emotional health was still in so much danger.
"I just wanted to get out of the marriage and out of the house."
Heartbreakingly, as her moving date grew closer, her devastation grew and she struggled to film on The X Factor.
"Every room held a memory, and I didn’t realise it, but I think I was actually going through a nervous breakdown," she said.
The singer spent two months crying, sometimes silently into her pillow all night, certain that divorce was the only option.
Cheryl filed for divorce at London's High Court in May 2010 citing "unreasonable behaviour" from her then husband.
In September that year the former couple were granted a decree nisi at the High Court on the grounds of Cole's admitted unreasonable behaviour.
They were granted a 'quickie' divorce - marking a completely clean break for the estranged pair.
