Dancing on Ice’s John Fashanu ‘signed up for ITV show in secret and cut his agent daughter out of deal’
DANCING On Ice hopeful John Fashanu is embroiled in a bitter feud with agent daughter Amal — who claims he signed up to the show in secret and cut her out of the deal.
She said the sneaky move came less than three years after he negotiated behind her back to reduce her fee over his appearance on Channel 4’s SAS: Who Dares Wins.
And the “dysfunctional” relationship with her “fame hungry” dad — known as Fash the Bash in his rough-and-tumble football days — has left her feeling “used”.
Amal, 34, told the Sun on Sunday: “Dad’s a joke. He went behind my back.
“I want nothing more to do with him right now. We’ve not talked for five months.
“That’s not how you act with family. He doesn’t think about how he hurts people.
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“As he gets older, it’s got worse too. I do love him but I don’t know that he loves me.”
Amal only found out former England and Wimbledon striker John, 60, was on the Sunday night show when she was asked if she could be filmed offering support.
She said: “I got a call from a woman at ITV saying, ‘Hi there Amal. We’re here with your dad on the ice and training for Dancing On Ice’.
“As well as his daughter I was also his agent, yet he’d kept everything a secret and cut me out completely.
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“I couldn’t speak. I was just so surprised.
“I could hear my dad in the background saying, ‘Hello darling!’.
“He must have known about the show for months but he never said anything. I didn’t even know I was now his ex-agent.”
John — who will be partnered by skating pro Alexandra Schauman — called Amal later that night.
He told her: “Isn’t it amazing? I’m doing Dancing On Ice.”
Amal said: “I just said, ‘Congratulations’, hung up and that was the last we’ve said to each other.”
Recalling his appearance on the 2020 SAS show, Amal said: “I helped him get on the programme.
";It was me and another guy working together as his agents and dad told the other guy, ‘Amal doesn’t need five per cent. That’s too much because she’s my daughter’.
“I only found that out because I was told by someone else who found it really disgusting.”
After his playing days, John co-hosted Gladiators in the mid-90s and was runner up in the second series of I’m A Celebrity.
He split from his first wife when Amal was three over cheating allegations.
Fashanu had two sons and a daughter with his second wife.
His third marriage ended in 2015 amid more cheating claims and he now lives in Nigeria with his new partner and two children.
Amal said the family were shocked to find he had flown into the UK for Dancing On Ice training without telling them.
Amal, who also owns a designer handbags business, said: “We wondered if he was having some sort of breakdown. He’s never even set foot on the ice.
“He’s a 60-year-old retired footballer who’s had lots of injuries. He’s really tall and heavy.
“As his agent, I would not have advised him to do the show — but he’s not being guided by the people who know him best.”
She now hopes to focus on a singing career but added: “I’m not saying I’ll never speak to him again — I don’t know what will happen.
“I just need him to realise how genuinely upset I am.”
Amal is the founder of The Justin Fashanu Foundation, set up in her uncle’s name to fight prejudice in professional sport and promote mental health awareness.
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Justin was the first openly gay pro footballer. He killed himself in 1998.
John Fashanu and Dancing On Ice declined to comment earlier tonight.