Love Island’s Paige Thorne has opened up about the dramatic Casa Amor recoupling from this year’s series of the ITV2 dating show, which saw her return to Jacques O’Neill.
During the episode, Jacques dramatically chose to stay coupled up with Paige, leaving Cheyanne Kerr devastated and confused after the pair had shared a bed and kisses once the villas were split.
When it came to the recoupling, Jacques said he’d been through a “test” that had “made up his mind” and he decided to stick with Paige.
Yet when Paige also came back single from Casa Amor single after staying loyal throughout, Cheyenne made sure Paige knew exactly what he’d been up to in the main villa.
“I felt like I had a connection with someone. I suppose my version of a test is different to someone else’s,” Cheyanne said. When asked who she had a connection with, she responded Jacques.
“He said he can’t trust himself, shared a bed,” she continued, explaining Jacques’ behaviour in Casa Amor.
Asked by Laura Whitmore if she thought she would be standing up rather than sat with him, Cheyanne said: “I weren’t sure but I know Paige is a nice girl, hope he treats her nice.”
Paige said: “It’s not really what you wanna hear when you come back. It’s just one of those things. I don’t think it’s quite sunk in yet.”
Paige has now opened up about the dramatic moment, explaining that she had twigged before returning to the villa that something “bad” had happened during their period of separation.
Appearing on former Love Island star Toby Aromolaran’s podcast Fancy A Chat, Paige said: “I knew it was going south when I was last to go in for the recoupling.
“I was sitting in that car park saying, ‘boys if I'm getting mugged off in here I'm walking’. I was going off before I even went in there. I knew it was going to be bad.”
She continued: “I had the biggest smile on my face walking in. Then it was the comment as soon as I sat down, he went, ‘I've tested myself by the way’ and I knew.
“[I thought] I'm going to kill him. It was fine, it was expected. It's what the show is. He's a young guy.”
Toby suggested the Casa Amor period of the show is put in motion “to kill the boys” and Paige joked: “It's not even a test for the girls, it's the boys and they fail every time.”
She added of Jacques’ behaviour during Casa Amor: “I also thought he would have been a lot more respectful along the way, just because of how we had been.”