Freddie Flintoff's new TV role, model wife and secret health battle

Freddie Flintoff will be back on our TV screens this Christmas as the new host of Bullseye, with the iconic gameshow returning after nearly three decades.

The England cricket great was named as host earlier this year and admitted he "couldn't believe" he had been given the job, as he explained: “I love the darts and Bullseye was one of my favourite shows as a kid. Can't quite believe I'll get to host this Christmas special. You can't beat a bit of Bully!”

Flintoff, 47, will make his return to presenting on the ITV reboot two years after being involved in a life-changing accident while filming for Top Gear, which led him to quit his role as a co-host on the show.

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He had been driving an open-topped three-wheeled car at 130mph around the show's test track when it later flipped over in the icy conditions. With no airbag in the vehicle, his face was dragged along the tarmac leaving him with horrific facial scars as well as several broken ribs.

While he survived, he was left with large scars from the incident and has suffered psychologically ever since, admitting that he has struggled with anxiety, nightmares and flashbacks. Filming was halted on the series with the programme then shelved "for the foreseeable future", while a huge compensation settlement with Flintoff - believed to be in the region of £9 million - was reached.

After the crash, the cricket star was immediately taken to hospital and reportedly underwent four hours on the operating table as surgeons battled to fix the injuries to his face. His wife Rachael then rushed from their home in Altrincham to the hospital in Surrey, and was told to "expect the worst" by a surgeon.

Rachael has been central to her husband's recovery, having reportedly "begged" him to stay off work and take time to recover from his injuries, according to the Mail. The couple have been married since 2005, having met three years earlier while she was at an event at Edgbaston cricket ground to promote her business.

Now 43, Rachael has run a successful events company called Strawberry Promotions since she was a teenager, and was formerly signed to the famous Storm Models agency, appearing in a number of popular magazines. Before she started her business at the age of 19, she had been enrolled on a law and French degree at Sheffield University, but quit and briefly worked at Capital Radio before pursuing her entrepreneurial ambitions.

In an interview with the Mail, she admitted that she wasn't initially attracted to Flintoff, but was soon won over by his charm and sense of humour.

“He really wasn't my type physically, because I generally prefer dark men," she said. "But I thought he was the funniest guy I had ever met. He obtained my phone number and texted me a couple of times, and we went up for a drink, and I was really blown away by his charm.”

Together, the pair have four children - Holly, Corey, Rocky and Preston - and live together in a £2.5m house in Altrincham. The former cricketer is reported to have a net worth of around £16m.

Flintoff previously opened up to Rachael about another debilitating health battle that he had been living with in secret for more than half his life. In a BBC documentary, which aired two years before his Top Gear crash, he revealed that he had bulimia, an eating disorder that sees sufferers bingeing on food before making themselves sick or using laxatives or even doing too much exercise to stop any weight gain.

The cricketer said that his eating disorder had developed after he was labelled as the "fat cricketer" by the press in his early twenties, having gained weight at the start of his career. As he found himself increasingly in the public eye, he said that he regularly made himself sick.

While he confided in Rachael about what he was doing, he couldn't bring himself to admit how often he was doing it, meaning she was unaware that - at his worst, he was making himself throw up after every meal.

"It's such a hard thing to admit," said Flintoff. "I plan it, it's a pre-planned act. You put your fingers down your throat and it starts - I can stop doing this whenever I want, this isn't an illness, this is me.

"I've had periods I've not done it for a long time, I've done it this year. I know it's not right but I can't say it will stop or when it will happen again. For years I've kept it hidden, apart from my own experience I know nothing about it. Part of me doesn't want to know."

He added: "I feel like that every time I eat, it doesn't matter what it is, it's with every mouthful I feel like I should be sick. You feel you should just be able to stop it. If I don't train I can feel really down but I didn't realise until now that could be part of the bulimia.

"Not 20 minutes goes past without me thinking about it, it's constantly on your mind," he added. "It's exhausting. There are people in the gym trying to get bigger and that's my worst nightmare. I want to be lighter and smaller.

"I need to train on an empty stomach, I don't want to be burning off food, I want to be burning off what I've got. I'm always trying to lose weight. I feel better when I'm lighter. The main thing is an anxiety towards food and what I'm putting in my mouth and should I do it."