Mike Tindall reveals unexpected detail about the royal family

Mike Tindall has revealed a detail about his royal in-laws – and it’s in stark contrast to Meghan Markle’s claim in her Netflix series. Here he's pictured at the Wimbledon Tennis Championships on July 10, 2024 in London. Photo / Getty Images

Zara Phillip’s husband, retired rugby star Mike Tindall, has revealed a detail about his royal in-laws - and it’s in stark contrast to Meghan Markle’s claim in her Netflix series.

The difficulties that arise when joining the royal family have been in sharp focus in recent years, largely due to Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s revelations.

But while the Duke of Sussex’s memoir, Spare, delivered a largely unflattering view of the institution’s initiation process, a new royal book is painting quite a different picture.

Mike Tindall, who married Princess Anne’s daughter Zara Phillips in 2011, is set to publish his own memoir in the coming days, in which he described his own entry into royal life as “simple”.

“Believe it or not, marrying into the royal family was pretty easy for me,” the 45-year-old former rugby union player revealed in The Good, the Bad & the Rugby -Unleashed, which was co-written with his podcast co-hosts, James Haskell and Alex Payne.

“They were always nice to me, and I was always nice to them. Simple really.”

Tindall’s experience is clearly in stark contrast to that of the Duchess of Sussex, who claimed in her and Harry’s Netflix series that she’d found members of the family “formal” and hadn’t shown warmth toward her.

“I guess I started to understand very quickly that the formality on the outside carried through to the inside … that there is a forward-facing way of being and then you close the door, and you go ‘Oh … okay, we can relax now’,” she said in Harry & Meghan.

“But that formality carries over on both sides and that was surprising to me.”

The rift that developed shortly afterwards between herself and senior royals, including Prince William and Catherine, Princess of Wales, is of course, very well-documented.

Tindall and Phillips have three children together – Mia, 10, Lena, 6, and Lucas, 3 – and are understood to be very close with the Wales.

They’re regular fixtures at royal events, joining the family for Christmas at Sandringham and other significant occasions including King Charles III’s coronation last year.