Amanda Holden admitted her reason for wanting a divorce from Les Dennis was 'horribly brutal'

Amanda Holden and Les Dennis were married for eight years before an affair rocked - and ultimately ended - their marriage.

Now, Holden, 52, has opened up about the 'horribly brutal' reason she wanted a divorce.

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The Britain's Got Talent judge tied the knot with comedian Dennis in 1995, when she was 22-years-old and he, 40.

However, their relationship came to a devastating end when she had an affair with Neil Morrissey.

The couple tried everything they could to make their marriage work but ultimately filed for divorce in 2003.

But, even though it was Holden who'd had the affair, Dennis let her claim that he'd cheated to speed up the divorce process, claiming his 'affair' with an unnamed woman made it 'intolerable' to live with him.

Soon after the split, she shared a 'brutal' confession about her feelings towards him, admitting that it was her idea to get a divorce.

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She said: “I terribly want children but I didn't want to have them with Les. That's a horribly brutal thing to say, but when you do, you know you have to move on.”

Holden is now married to music industry boss, Chris Hughes, with whom she shares two daughters, Alexa, 17, and 11-year-old Hollie.

Dennis also remarried, tying the knot with his third wife, Claire Nicholson, in 2009. They share two children, daughter Eleanor and son Thomas.

Holden has since opened up about her affair and the impact of it being public knowledge. "I found the fall from grace incredibly hard to deal with, she said. "I can't bear not to be liked. Then I had an affair and overnight turned into this awful person.

"There are no hard feelings with Les. I wish him the best, but we've both moved on. I don't believe women have affairs for no reason. Women don't seek sex - we seek love and affirmation."

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Dennis has previously shared the remark from a plumber that should have let him ‘know’ his marriage to Amanda wasn’t going to last.

In an interview with Richard Herring, he said that everyone was ‘waiting’ for their marriage to go wrong but joked that ‘nobody told [him]’.

He said: “I remember one day in our house in Highgate, it was Grand National Day, and the plumber was there to fix the washing machine.

“And Amanda came running and said, ‘we need to put a bet on’, so [I gave her] ten quid and she went, ‘oh we need to put more than that on.’ So I went, ‘twenty?’ And the plumber went, ‘kids, eh?’

“Maybe I should have known then.”