He thought he'd spend Christmas with her but she planned a split

DESPERATE Les Dennis was begging Amanda Holden not to dump him until the very last minute before their split was made public.

Amanda, 31, insisted there was no turning back and said that she and Les - once dubbed TV's golden couple - had no future together.

A friend said: "It was awful, gruesome stuff. Les just swallowed what pride he had left and implored her not to do it. He said he would do anything for her not to dump him.

"But Amanda had reached the end of the line. She fell out of love with him ages ago. She tried to make herself love him but she couldn't do it."

Amanda made up her mind that she and Les, 48, were finished while he was taking part in the Celebrity Big Brother in November.

She told him of her feelings when they finally had a reunion in the first week of December, but agreed to think it over.

At that stage Les was still convinced he could persuade her to stay and that they would still spend the festive season together at their pounds 2million home in Primrose Hill, North London.

However in the week before Christmas - when she had finished filming the BBC1 hairdressing drama Cutting It - Amanda finally decided that their marriage was over and she told him. She said it was best if they announced the split as soon as possible after Christmas.

Her bombshell decision led to a pleading phone calls from Les, who simply could not believe that their seven-year marriage was over.

Fearing that he was losing her, Les desperately tried to woo her back by buying a country retreat for them in Norfolk for almost pounds 1million.

He talked her into the joint purchase of a house in Fern Hill, which used to be part of the Queen's Sandringham estate a mile away.

The pair successfully bid for the colonial-style luxury property eight weeks ago but since then the purchase has been stalled.

"The big country house was one of Les's last rolls of the dice," said the friend. "All he wanted was to have kids and lead a cosy family life and the house would have been ideal."

Les and Amanda already own a pounds 120,000 cottage in the village of Docking, four miles away. They are regulars at the Hoste Arms, a 17th century hotel and restaurant in the upmarket village of Burnham Market.

Amanda was guest of honour at a ceremony to open an extension at the hotel during the summer.

She also returned to Burnham Market last month to turn on the village Christmas lights with Lucy Gaskell and Sian Reeves, her co- stars in Cutting It.

At the time Les was still in the Celebrity Big Brother House and Amanda joked that she wanted him to stay there so she could have "a nice peaceful week" without him.

She asked the watching crowd to help by voting to evict DJ Goldie from the house and keep Les inside.

The house is being sold by builder Nigel Stonebridge, who has spent months renovating and extending it. He has added a first-floor balcony which enjoys panoramic views across the Norfolk countryside. Mr Stonebridge's father David said yesterday: "I don't know yet how the two of them splitting up is going to affect the house sale."

A friend of Les said: "He genuinely thought this house could be a new start for the two of them, a chance to wipe the slate clean, but it wasn't enough."

Les is believed to have spent Christmas in his home city of Liverpool while Amanda and her relatives had a family get-together in the marital home 200 miles away.

Effectively banned from his own home, Dennis is thought to have headed north to be with sisters Amanda and Margaret.

Amanda has booked a trip to Spain for herself and two pals to celebrate New Year. She is due to check in at a five-star in Barcelona today.

It is not clear what Les's plans are.

Two weeks ago he drunkenly told a Sunday Mirror reporter at the Marriott Hotel in Bristol how he would be spending the festive period with his wife. "I'm really looking forward to spending Christmas with Amanda. We've already got our tree up. Her parents will be there."

Yet even then he appeared to know that Amanda was leaving him.

After asking writer Rachel Kaufman, 28, to go to his room "for a cuddle", he told her: "Age-gap relationships don't work. My last one didn't."

Already talking about Amanda in the past tense, morose Les sank into booze-addled depression in front of bemused fellow guests.

Friends of Amanda said yesterday that Les's embarrassing public ramblings in the hotel had been the last straw and gave her the excuse she was looking for to finally dump him. One said: "Amanda wasn't jealous of Les for chatting up the girl. She was past caring about that. She was just furious that he had made a fool of himself and in the process made her look pretty stupid for being with him.

"Having him in Big Brother farting and talking to chickens and generally making an idiot of himself was torture enough for Amanda.

"Not only could she not bear to go to the Big Brother house to meet him, when she sent her video message to him she couldn't face doing it alone and got two of her co-stars from Cutting It to do it with her. So to see in the paper that he had been drunkenly chatting up women really finished things off nicely."

Les was so devastated by the impending collapse of his second marriage that he turned to his friends and ex-girlfriends for comfort and advice.

Earlier this month he confided in former lover Sophie Aldred that his marriage was all but over.

Ironically it was Les's affair with actress Sophie that broke up his marriage to first wife Lynne. Last night Sophie said: "I spoke to Les a couple of weeks ago, and I knew the break-up was on the cards.

"I feel really sad for them. My relationship with Les is in the past, but we are still good friends, and we all get on well together."

Other friends and relatives were told of the marriage split in advance and asked not to speak to the Press about it.

Meanwhile speculation was mounting about Amanda and actor Neil Morrisey who she had an affair with in 2000. Morrisey revealed three weeks ago that they still speak regularly.

Morrisey, star of Men Behaving Badly, was quizzed yesterday on whether his remarks were a hint that he and Amanda were seeing each other again.

He said: "It's all trash. I just want to be left alone."

Yesterday Amanda's mother Judith and step-father Leslie Collister packed up their car and left the Primrose Hill house. But they denied they were helping Amanda to move out.

Mrs Collister said: "This is all our stuff. We have been staying here for a while and now we are returning home to Devon."

Copyright 2002 MGN LTD
Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights Reserved.