Emile Heskey 'facing bankruptcy, with HMRC filing a petition in the High Court'

Former Liverpool, Leicester City and Aston Villa striker Emile Heskey is reportedly facing bankruptcy.

The 45-year-old - who also won 62 caps for England - had a net worth that was estimated to be £12million back in 2009.

However, according to The Sun, he has faced financial woes since joining a celebrity investment scheme which has now been placed at the centre of a £1.6bn tax dispute.

The report claims this has culminated in HMRC filing bankruptcy petition against Heskey in the High Court.

It comes after several financial problems have been reported in regards to the former striker over recent years.

For example, in 2023, he was found to have defaulted on £92,000 of tax from his work as a football development officer between 2017 and 2020, with Heskey given a £42,000 penalty.

Similarly, a bar in Cheshire that he ran with his wife Chantelle Tagoe - with whom he has three kids with - was wound up by the courts in May this year with a reported £163,000 worth of debts.

Documents lodged at Companies House showed that a winding-up order spelled the end for the venue, called Parea, which was opened in 2018.

It was closed after a local catering company applied to have the company wound up over unpaid debts. Parea was a regular haunt of footballers and TV stars, including Real Housewives of Cheshire regulars.

The report did not state whether the winding up order came from Heskey's business failing or the aforementioned investment scheme.

The celebrity investment scheme was reportedly run by Ingenious Media, which is a financing company that has backed more than 60 films.

The scheme was said to include investors such as David Beckham, Steven Gerrard, Jeremy Paxman, Robbie Williams and Heskey and required a minimum £50,000 stake. It has faced significant controversy in recent years.

Gerrard and famous composer Andrew Lloyd Webber were among those to have launched legal proceedings against HSBC in 2018 for 'dishonestly assisting' Ingenious Media.

They claimed Ingenious' promotional materials 'made representations of fact which were false and which they had no reasonable grounds for believing were true’.

Heskey, who also has three children with his ex-wife Kylee Pinsent, retired in 2016 after a two-year spell with Bolton Wanderers.

In recent years, he has been working as head of football development with Leicester City's Women's team, while he also linked-up with England Under 18s earlier this year.