Ron Hall has claimed Love Island producers interfered with his relationship with Lana Jenkins in the villa, which "p***ed him off".
After a bumpy ride at the start of the winter 2023 series the pair, both 25, settled down and came second, beaten to the £50,000 prize by Kai Fagan and Sanam Harrinanan.
Yet Ron has claimed their rocky road to a relationship was due to producers keeping them apart in the ITV show.
He became frustrated with the fact it took him and Lana four weeks to officially recouple, having previously coupled up on day one.
According to Ron, the time frame was to do with the "ordering of the re-couplings".
"[For the] first four weeks I was like, 'This is actually p*ssing me off. Can I just get in the couple that I want to be in?'", he candidly told former Gogglebox stars Joe and George on their podcast Not My Bagg.
He claims they were kept apart for hours each day in the villa.
Ron added: "We are very separated from the girls for the majority of the day; lunchtime, two hours, dinner, two hours, getting ready, probably three hours… mornings, an hour.
"There actually aren’t that many hours that you spend with the girls, so you actually have to get on with the boys. We had so many jokes; things that happened in the bedroom, like playing games or whatever.”
The Mirror has contacted ITV for comment.
Despite the challenges inside the villa, the couple appears to have remained strong on the outside.
Ron, who lives in Essex, says the pair have only spent six days apart since leaving the South African villa on March 13.
Speaking to MailOnline, Ron said: "I struggle to be apart from her. We’ve only spent six days apart since coming out.
"Our end goal is to move in together but at the minute we want to be able to buy our own places and then eventually move in together."
While the pair seem to be going from strength to strength, rumours flew they were in trouble before they even landed back in the UK amid reports they had an argument on the flight.
It was claimed ITV producers were forced to get involved after the makeup artist and financial advisor became embroiled in a heated row.
However, the couple have since "set the record straight" on what happened between them.
Answering fan questions for Cosmopolitan, Ron read: "Have you seen any rumours about yourself that you'd like to set straight?"
Lana answered: "There was a rumour that we had an argument on the plane, but really Ron got drunk on the plane."
"I had a great flight," Ron joked. Lana added: "I looked after him, so I wouldn't say it was an argument, I would say that I literally had to look after him like a baby."
"Yeah, I was a pain in the a**e, I'm not going to lie," Ron admitted. "I was just - I was a problem, but a funny problem. And then they just stuck us in different cabs and then they've just made this thing, so we're setting that straight."
Lana added: "Yeah, we didn't argue."
