Madonna To Divorce Guy Richie

Sources have revealed exclusively to Holy Moly that Madonna has hired Britain's toughest divorce lawyer, Nicholas Mostyn QC, to kick start divorce proceedings against her husband of eight years, Guy Ritchie.

Mostyn will no doubt strike fear into the heart of Guy – he is the man who sorted out Heather Mills, trounced Earl Spencer and almost destroyed Ray Parlour in his previous high profile divorce cases.

Suggestions made seem to indicate that, surprisingly, Madonna and Guy do NOT have a pre-nup in place, leaving Guy in line to walk away with up to half of Madge's fortune (according to Forbes she earned $72m last year alone).

Long standing rumours of a rift between the couple are finally confirmed with this news, as Holy Moly's sources suggest nothing more than "growing apart" as the reason for the split. They have spent increasing amounts of time apart with both Madonna's new album and tour and Guy's revived movie career are cited as reasons. The adoption of David Banda attracted a huge wave of negative publicity, allegedly putting further strain on the relationship. The couple have one other son, Rocco, and Lourdes, Madonna's daughter from a relationship with her fitness instructor Carlos Leon.

Madge's meeting with Nicholas Mostyn took place at his London office just over ten days ago.

Don't put any bets on seeing this dragged into the courts McCartney-style though – we can only assume that both Madonna and Guy Ritchie will want to keep this a very private affair.

Having said that, Madonna is theoretically entitled to half of Guy's fortune too – which at least means she'll be able to continue making money out of Snatch. Pleasure.

HolyMoly