Who Did Zara Cheat on Sam With? The Brahim Fouradi Affair

Brahim Fouradi had eight songs in the Dutch Top 40 in 2022. He co-wrote the most-streamed Dutch single of that year, scored a number one, and has spoken at music industry conferences in Amsterdam. Since leaving Simon Cowell’s Syco Entertainment after the 2019 X Factor: Celebrity series, he has worked continuously as a songwriter, producer, and artist manager.

He has not been asked, in any published interview, about Zara McDermott.

Fouradi is the man Zara McDermott cheated on Sam Thompson with during that same series. She was 22. He was 33, holding a senior position at the label that oversaw the talent on a show she was competing on.

Zara McDermott cheated on Sam Thompson with Brahim Fouradi, a Dutch music executive serving as A&R Director at Simon Cowell’s Syco Entertainment during the filming of The X Factor: Celebrity in October 2019. McDermott denied the affair for nearly a year before publicly admitting it in October 2020. What followed played out across Instagram, Made in Chelsea, and This Morning, and left a five-year relationship permanently weakened even after the couple reconciled.

Who Is Brahim Fouradi?

Fouradi was born in Amsterdam on 19 November 1985. He and his brother Mohamed performed as a Dutch hip-hop duo called Fouradi from 2005 to 2012. After the duo folded, he moved into A&R, working as a consultant at Sony Music before co-founding La Foux, an Amsterdam-based artist management agency, with his brother in 2012.

In 2015, Syco Entertainment brought him in as International A&R Manager. He was promoted to A&R Director in 2017 and spent the next four years working on The X Factor UK, Britain’s Got Talent, and America’s Got Talent. He was well established in the industry long before X Factor: Celebrity began filming in 2019.

After leaving Syco, his career in the Netherlands gained considerable momentum. He co-wrote “Vluchtvlucht” by Kris Kross Amsterdam, the most-streamed Dutch single of 2022, and scored an official number one with “Olivia” by Antoon. He had eight separate entries in the Dutch Top 40 that year.

He has made no public statement about the McDermott affair at any point.

What Happened on The X Factor: Celebrity Set

McDermott competed on The X Factor: Celebrity in October 2019 as part of No Love Lost, a group assembled from Love Island alumni including Eyal Booker, Samira Mighty, and Wes Nelson. They were mentored by Louis Walsh and finished in eighth place.

At home, she had been dating Sam Thompson since earlier that year.

A source close to Thompson told MailOnline what was happening backstage: “Sam suspected quite early on that something was going on between Zara and Brahim. She was spending increasing amounts of time with him backstage and hanging around after hours. Sam found out and kicked off. He’s devastated about how things have turned out.”

The affair was denied when reports first appeared in the press in late 2019. That denial held for almost a year.

Zara McDermott’s Public Confession

In October 2020, McDermott posted a statement to Instagram:

“A huge mistake I made a year ago has recently come to light and I want to face this head-on. I don’t condone being unfaithful and I made a huge mistake at a time in my life when I was hugely selfish and immature. I want to apologise to my Sam for everything I have put him through, for the pain, the embarrassment, the anger and the hurt.”

On 12 October 2020, she followed this with a video montage addressed publicly to Thompson: “You are everything. You are my moon and all my stars and everything in between. I miss you. I love you more and more every day.”

Public reaction split sharply. Some called it sincere. Others called it manipulative. Thompson, by multiple accounts, found the public nature of it embarrassing rather than moving.

The Made in Chelsea Confrontation

Made in Chelsea brought the full confrontation to screen. Thompson and McDermott sat across from each other on a park bench, cameras on both of them.

Thompson accused her of feeling guilty only because she got caught. He noted she had continued liking Fouradi’s Instagram posts after the affair had come to light. He made clear he did not consider it a one-off, accusing her of “consistently” seeing Fouradi behind his back.

McDermott also appeared on This Morning, where she explained: “When it happened I genuinely thought that me and Sam were going to break up, inevitably. I just thought we were hanging on by a tiny thread.”

She wrote Thompson a private letter delivered through his friend Reza, which was read on camera. The key line: “I am so deeply ashamed of my actions and the way I have hurt you. I was selfish, immature and stupid.”

Did Sam Thompson Forgive Zara McDermott?

By December 2020, at McDermott’s 24th birthday, the couple had confirmed they were back together.

Thompson’s position on the affair became clearer in a 2023 Sunday People interview, where he acknowledged having been unfaithful to previous girlfriends and said: “You’d be some w**er to have done it yourself and can’t forgive.”*

On his Staying Relevant podcast, he described how he reached that point: “I believe in forgiveness. You can only heal when you forgive the other person. It’s easier said than done but you’ve got to strive for that.”

Of McDermott: “She was 22, so young. You can just tell when someone has a beautiful heart and a beautiful soul and just messed up.”

His sister Louise Thompson held a harder line. She had been openly critical following the affair and, while she eventually agreed to give McDermott another chance, a source later told MailOnline that the family tension never fully eased.

Why Did Sam and Zara Split Up?

The couple stayed together until late 2024, five years after the affair. Thompson had won I’m a Celebrity in December 2023. McDermott had appeared on Strictly Come Dancing that same year. Thompson had spoken about proposing as recently as early 2024.

The split was reported in December 2024. Neither made a formal announcement. Thompson addressed it on his podcast in January 2025, telling co-host Pete Wicks: “It was tough. It’s been a tough month. A real tough month.”

A source close to both told MailOnline: “Their bond never fully recovered from the infidelity. It just felt like they were delaying the inevitable. They had drifted apart and their lives had become very different.”

Sam Thompson and Zara McDermott: Relationship Timeline

Where Zara McDermott and Sam Thompson Are Now

McDermott began dating Louis Tomlinson in early 2025. The pair were first spotted together in Aldeburgh, Suffolk, in March 2025. McDermott confirmed the relationship in April 2025 via an Instagram story that captured a visible glimpse of Tomlinson’s tattoo.

In May 2026, photographs of McDermott alongside Joey Essex, taken during filming of Cooking with the Stars, spread across TikTok and X. One image appeared to show Essex kissing her on the forehead. None of the parties commented publicly. Online discussion turned immediately back to Fouradi and 2019.

Sam Thompson is now in a relationship with DJ and model Talitha Balinska.

Zara McDermott has answered for the 2019 affair in Instagram statements, in a private letter read on national television, in broadcast interviews, and across a Made in Chelsea storyline. Every new story about her since has looped back to it. The Joey Essex photographs in May 2026 took less than 24 hours to become a conversation about something that happened seven years ago.

Brahim Fouradi has not been asked a single question about any of it. He was 33 when the affair occurred. She was 22. He held a senior professional position with authority over the contestants on the show where it happened. His career in Amsterdam continued without any reported disruption.

His name appears in the third paragraph of most articles covering this story and disappears. Nobody has put a direct question to him. Not in 2020, not since.

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