Louis Walsh

X Factor judge Louis Walsh has hit back after former Girls Aloud star protegé Cheryl Cole claimed he was an absentee manager of Girls Aloud.

X Factor judge Louis Walsh has hit back after former Girls Aloud star protegé Cheryl Cole claimed he was an absentee manager of Girls Aloud.

The Irish music manager worked with Cole, 28, for three years, as Girls Aloud manager.

The pair were later both judges for three series of the hit TV show.

But the singer and ex-wife of Chelsea star Ashley Cole accused Walsh of having “zero involvement” at the start of Girls Aloud.

“Louis claimed to be our manager but he never did it,” she said . “We didn’t talk to him or anything like that.

“He just took a cheque. Literally, we didn’t have management.”

But Walsh hit back, exclaiming: ““What is she peddling this time?

“Eyelashes or hair spray? It’s definitely not her music,” he told Heat magazine.

“At least I am still on The X Factor and happy to be there. I’m a much better manager than she is a singer.”

Cole was axed from the US X Factor and did not return to the UK version.

“She seems to be in the fashion business now, selling fake hair pieces, fake eyelashes, fake everything,” rapped Walsh.

“Cheryl is a great clothes horse. Nice girl, but likes to get her own way.”

Cole recently told Marie Claire magazine about starting out with Girls Aloud: “We worked like crazy in those days. We didn’t stop for breath. We never had management. Louis claimed to be our manager but he never did it.”

She said: “I talk to him because now I get that business is business and that’s how he runs his but he never chose a hit. Who chose them? Us.”