The manager of Jill Scott’s former club, Manchester City, has praised her “steely determination” and sense of “fun” following her win on I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here!
The former England footballer, 35, triumphed during the live final last week to be crowned Queen of the Jungle.
Scott won the first round of the final public vote with 47.3%, compared with 21.7% for former health secretary Matt Hancock and 31% for Hollyoaks actor Owen Warner.
She then won the final vote with 57.7%, compared with Warner’s 42.3%.
Speaking at a press conference ahead of his side’s Women’s Super League game against Brighton on Sunday, City manager Gareth Taylor said Scott’s former colleagues suspected she would do well on the ITV show.
He said: “Hindsight’s a wonderful thing. A lot of us were saying that we’d have liked to have benefited by her favourable odds at the beginning of the show.
“She was great, and when you look at the programme, and when you (look) at what that kind of set-up is, you had a real feeling that Jill would do well in that space.
“She’s a real top team player, she’s great with people and she certainly showed that. She certainly behaved in the way that Jill does – she’s fun, she’s supporting and she’s got that steely determination.
“I was almost a little bit surprised with some of the things she did, certainly some of the eating challenges and certainly some of the ones from a great height.
“But she loves that, she loves the excitement and the challenge definitely.”
Mr Taylor said he has not spoken to Scott, who was part of the Women’s Euro 2022 winning team before retiring in the summer, since her jungle victory but many of her former teammates will have.
“Jill’s hard to get hold of, let’s just say, and she’s going to be on a different level now,” he said.
“I’m sure a lot of the girls would have been in contact with her, and they’re probably struggling to get hold of her at the moment because I can imagine the demand is really high for her, and rightly so.”
The midfielder posted a story on Instagram on Wednesday showing she had arrived back in the UK from Australia.
It showed her returning to Boxx2Boxx Coffee in Manchester, which she owns with her fiancee Shelly Unitt.