By Paul Higgins

A FORMER Scottish rugby World Cup star has been fined after being convicted of assaulting his wife’s alleged lover.

Simon Danielli, 37, was found guilty of punching Michael Browne, but the father-of-three was cleared of assaulting his estranged wife and damaging her phone in the same incident.

Danielli claimed that Mr Browne, whom he suspected was having an affair with his wife former model Olivia, was injured when he fell during a “full pelt” sprint as he fled, from 37-year-old former Ulster and Scotland winger.

But district judge Mark Hamill told Newtownards Magistrates Court he was satisfied Edinburgh-born Danielli had struck him in the face.

Ireland and Ulster captain Rory Best attended the court to give character evidence that his one-time team-mate would back away from a fight and was a man of “honesty and integrity”.

Judge Hamill highlighted the fact that at almost every court level, from the high court to the industrial tribunal court, there are cases of Danielli against Danielli leading him to “sadly adduce that these two are at daggers, they’re logger heads” with all the relevant “baggage” that comes with the disintegration of a marriage.

He said his court had been “replete with baggage in this case”and added: “The idea that the unsupported word of a squabbling spouse against that of the other could provide proof beyond a reasonable doubt is unlikely enough at the best of times.

“When you combine it with the background of ongoing legal backdrops in almost every single court available, it makes it all the more unlikely that the prosecution are going to achieve proof beyond reasonable doubt.”

Mrs Danielli faces a trial in the same court in front of the same judge accused of causing criminal damage to her estranged husband’s £38,000 Jaguar car in August 2015.

Judge Hamill told their defence teams several months ago of binding over orders being handed out where the estranged couple would promise “to be of good behaviour” instead of, as he put it, “washing their dirty linen in public”.

But over the course of the four-day hearing, the court heard allegations of illicit extra-marital affairs, covert bugging devices being placed in the marital home, a GPS tracking device being hidden in his car and general animosity. His father-in-law, property tycoon Shamus Jennings, first of all pleaded with Danielli to work at the marriage and then allegedly threatened to “destroy him” when it broke down.

Giving evidence, Ireland and Ulster captain Rory Best said he had never saw his former team mate be violent. He said: “Simon is the sort of person you want in a squad because he is the life and soul of the party. There’s nobody in the squad who didn’t like him.”

Following the case, Danielli said: “I deeply regret the incident which led to these charges. I did not engage with my wife at any time during this incident, let alone assault her, and I am pleased to be vindicated of this.”