Rebekah Vardy is selling the luxurious Portuguese villa she and husband Jamie call their ‘sanctuary’ for an optimistic £9.7million - as she foots the £4m costs bill for her ill-fated Wagatha Christie libel case.

Last month, Rebekah, 43, was ordered by a judge to pay £1.27m towards rival Coleen Rooney’s legal expenses, on top of her own bill, reported to be more than £2million, from the disastrous libel claim she brought in 2022.

The High Court case left her reputation ‘in tatters’ and had a similar effect on her ‘brand’ with potential advertisers.

Though husband Jamie, 38, has continued to be one of the Premier League’s big earners, pulling in an estimated £7.3m at Leicester City last season, and now linked to a possible transfer to Manchester United, there’s no doubt the family finances took a massive blow from the Wagatha scandal and its aftermath.

In recent years, the Vardys have rented out their beloved villa on the exclusive golf resort of Quinta do Lago for up to £30,000 a week, but now they’ve reluctantly decided to put up the for sale sign.

The property has been listed for sale with blue chip agents Knight Frank, with an incredible £9.7million price tag.

Though prices have risen strongly in the Algarve recently, by as much as 16 per cent, according to some estimates, the Vardys’ villa is definitely priced on the ‘optimistic side’, according to one agent speaking to MailOnline on condition of anonymity.

‘It’s certainly a stunning and very modern property, but there are many more traditionally-styled places in that area which some people might prefer, of similar size, but priced a lot more competitively,’ he said.

The villa, which has three pools, a gym, steam room and six bedrooms, overlooks the 18th green of the resort’s North course.

According to Knight Frank: ‘This magnificent property, built over four levels, showcases meticulous attention to lifestyle details.’

Other features in the four-storey home include a cinema room, roof terrace and sauna, on a plot of around 0.64 acres.

The particulars add: ‘In addition to the three external pools, which epitomize a contemporary lifestyle, the villa includes a central electro-chromic glass lift accessing each floor.

‘The impressively landscaped gardens complement the property’s style, creating a true haven for modern living.

‘The villa is conveniently located within walking distance of the golf course and other renowned amenities within the Quinta do Lago resort.’

In 2022 the couple had a scare when the luxury villa looked like it could be damaged by forest fires.

A source close to the family told the Sun at the time: ‘It’s been horrifying. Their neighbours have all been evacuated and one by one residents are being told to leave their homes.

'Becky can see smoke everywhere and she’s terrified about the kids breathing it in. The water is also down so she’s relying on bottled water which, obviously, there is only a finite amount of at home.

‘Jamie and their friends and family back home have all been really worried. Things are developing by the hour but she’s praying the fire brigades, who have been brilliant, can get things back under control.’

Mrs Vardy unsuccessfully sued the I’m A Celeb star in the High Court in 2022 after she was publicly accused of leaking stories about her to the press.

The catalyst for the famous Wagatha Christie case was a dramatic open letter written by Mrs Rooney and posted on social media in October 2019 in which she revealed she had turned detective to figure out who had been leaking the stories to the press.

Mrs Rooney publicly claimed Mrs Vardy’s account was the source behind three newspaper stories featuring fake details she had posted on her private Instagram profile - her travelling to Mexico for a ‘gender selection’ procedure, her planning to return to TV and the basement flooding at her home.

Penning that she had a ‘suspicion’ of who it could be, Mrs Rooney told her millions of followers that ‘to try and prove this’ she ‘came up with an idea’.

‘I blocked everyone from viewing my Instagram stories except ONE account,’ she wrote.

For the next five months, she uploaded ‘a series of false stories’ to see if ‘they made their way’ into the press.

 ‘And you know what, they did!’ she penned ‘The story about gender selection in Mexico, the story about returning to TV and then the latest story about the basement flooding in my new house.’

She continued to build suspense, writing: ‘It’s been tough keeping it to myself and not making any comment at all, especially when the stories have been leaked, however I had to. Now I know for certain which account/individual it’s come from.

‘I have saved and screenshotted all the original stories which clearly show just one person had viewed them.’

And then, she delivered her final iconic line: ‘It’s.......... Rebekah Vardy’s account.’

What followed was a tearful appearance from Rebekah on ITV’s Loose Women in February 2020 in which claimed the stress over the dispute had caused her to have anxiety attacks so severe she ‘ended up in hospital three times’.

The emotional display was met by Coleen with a statement to say she did not want to ‘engage in further public debate’ on the matter.

Four months later, in June 2020, Rebekah began legal proceedings against Coleen for libel with her lawyers alleging she had ‘suffered extreme distress, hurt, anxiety and embarrassment as a result of the publication of the post and the events which followed’.

At the first preliminary hearing in London’s High Court in November the same year, Mr Justice Warby ruled that Coleen’s famous letter ‘clearly identified’ Rebekah as being ‘guilty of the serious and consistent breach of trust’.

He concluded the ‘natural and ordinary’ meaning of the posts was that Rebekah had ‘regularly and frequently abused her status as a trusted follower of Mrs Rooney’s personal Instagram account’ by secretly informing the press of Coleen’s ‘private posts and stories’.

When the case returned to the courts in February 2022, a series of explosive messages between Rebekah and her agent Caroline Watt were revealed with Coleen’s lawyers alleging they were about her.

Rebekah denied that one message calling someone a ‘nasty b****’ was in reference to Coleen.

When asked by defence lawyers to present Ms Watt’s phone so they could further investigate the WhatsApp messages, they were told it had fallen into the North Sea when Ms Watt was on a boat during a holiday.

Coleen was denied permission to bring a High Court claim against Ms Watt for misuse of private information to be heard alongside the libel battle as it was brought too late.

Ms Watt was then dubbed not fit to give oral evidence, revoked permission for her witness statement to be used and withdrew her waiver which would have allowed journalists to say whether she was a source of the leaked stories.

Coleen’s barrister then told the High Court Rebekah ‘appears to accept’ her agent was the source of the leaked stories and argued her new statement suggested this but Rebekah claimed she ‘did not authorise or condone her’.

In May 2022, the women finally came face-to-face in court to give evidence as the Wagatha Christie trial began in the Royal Courts of Justice in London.

Coleen secured her victory the next month when Mrs Justice Steyn delivered her damning verdict, dismissing the claim made by Rebekah and finding Coleen had proved the meaning of her famous accusatory letter was ‘substantially true’.

Rebekah was accused in court – which she denied - of deliberately deleting WhatsApp messages central to the case as it was suggested her agent also intentionally dropped her phone in the North Sea.

The final judgement said swathes of Rebekah’s evidence given under oath had been ‘manifestly inconsistent’, ‘not credible’ and needed to be treated with ‘very considerable caution’.

The judge ruled that Mrs Vardy should pay 90 per cent of Mrs Rooney’s costs.

Vardy was also found liable to pay costs incurred by seven journalists who were potential witnesses but did not give evidence.