Mike Tindall jokingly tackles blonde I’m a Celeb crew member & pretends to throw her into water before heading to jungle

MIKE Tindall shocked an I’m A Celebrity crew member by jokingly tackling her yesterday — just hours before heading in to the jungle.

The former England rugby ace, 44, threw his arms around the masked-up blonde worker as he pretended to throw her off a pontoon into the water.

His beaming grin showed he was clearly living up to his royal wife Zara’s instructions to go and enjoy himself on the ITV show.

An onlooker said: “Mike cheekily ran up behind the pretty crew member before swinging her around on the pontoon. At one point he pretended to push her over the edge as he killed time while waiting to be taken to his first trial.

“Mike was certainly bursting with energy after being cooped up in isolation for a week and is bound to be full of practical jokes in the camp.”

Mike, who has children Mia, eight, Lena, four, and one-year-old Lucas with Princess Anne’s daughter, Zara, was with TV crews near the five-star Palazzo Versace on the Gold Coast of Australia. 

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His fellow campmates, Boy George, 61, Scarlette Douglas, 35, Sue Cleaver, 59, and Owen Warner, 23, were also around the pontoon and on a yacht as they prepared for the first challenge of the hit ITV series.

Mike, the first sort-of royal to appear on the reality show, has plenty of form for such high-jinks from his rugby days.

In 2011, he was fined and suspended by the RFU for dwarf-throwing antics in a New Zealand bar.

But it’s not his practical joking that Mike fears will infuriate the other celebrities, it’s his noisy eating — a habit his wife of 11 years despises. 

Speaking to The Celeb Report, Mike said: “Zara’s biggest worry is how loud I am when I eat.

“She will be very happy if someone comments about how loud I breathe when I eat because it’s always a point that she brings up.

“But when your nose has been mangled as much as mine has… it is just a by-product.

The 2003 Rugby World Cup winner suffered his first nose injury at the age of five before breaking it at least eight more times throughout his sporting career.

He added: “Zara told me to go and be myself, which is all you can be.

“She said to go enjoy yourself and be yourself.”

Mike will also join former Health Secretary Matt Hancock, 44, Love Island’s Olivia Attwood, 31, Charlene White, 42, Jill Scott, 35, Seann Walsh, 36, Babatunde Aleshe, 36, and radio DJ Chris Moyles, 48, in the jungle which starts today. 

But Mike says he already feels at home as he met Zara for the first time in Sydney, Australia, during the 2003 Rugby World Cup.

Sweetly referring to his wife as Z, he said: “Obviously, it’s difficult, but the saving grace is going to a country that we know very well, and Zara understands and gets it and that makes it a lot easier.”

Zara and their three children will remain at home on Princess Anne’s estate, Gatcombe Park in Gloucestershire, but may fly to Australia if Mike makes the final.

He said: “We’re not entirely sure yet, we haven’t fully made that decision and it’s probably how deep into the show we go.

“We have some work out here so if it got to the end then hopefully she’d be able to come out. We will have to wait and see really.”