Davina McCall has announced she has split from husband Matthew Robertson after 17 years of marriage. 

The former ‘Big Brother’ host confirmed the news in a statement (via The Sun), admitting it has been a “difficult time”.  

“I am very sad to say that Matthew and I have separated,” she said. 

“Our amazing children are our number one priority, above everything else so therefore we ask for as much space and respect from the media as possible while our family goes through this difficult time.”

The pair married in June 2000 and have three children together – Holly, 16, Tilly, 14 and 11-year-old Chester. 

Davina previously had a short-lived marriage to Andrew Leggett in 1997, with the couple divorcing after less than a year together. 

News of her split from Matthew comes just days after she posted on Instagram saying she had made “so many mistakes” in her life, but that “there is always a new day”. 

In 2014, Davina admitted her marriage had been through a tricky period, while she trained for her Sport Relief challenge, which saw her cross the UK in seven days by cycling, swimming and running.

Speaking to The Mirror at the time, she said: “We had a really difficult six months. Matthew’s dad was ill, I was doing the challenge and he’d hurt his shoulder.

“We weren’t arguing, but we had both been in a kind of tough place. Now we are here and we’ve been on holiday.

“Getting through stuff like that makes the next step better.

“If you never give it a chance to get through something difficult, you never get to that step where you think, ‘I know you, and you know me’.”

The 50-year-old added had they been younger, they would have split, saying: “When you’re in your twenties and you have a tough six months, then that’s a break up. But when you’re married it’s nothing.

“You always have to think when you are in a relationship that if you have a tough six months then it’s nothing in the grand scheme of things.”