MAFS reunion: Cast share brutally honest thoughts on their matches

Every season of Married At First Sight fans have questioned whether the couples are ‘expertly matched’ to find love or to create drama and cause chaos within the experiment.

During Yahoo’s All-Star MAFS Reunion, a number of the reality show’s most memorable brides and grooms spoke openly about the matchmaking process and revealed why they really think they were paired with their partner in the experiment.

Evelyn Ellis

Although the season 10 bride made it all the way to Final Vows with her ‘husband’ Rupert Bugden - where they ultimately decided not to continue their relationship in the real world - Evelyn Ellis admits she has no idea why they were matched together.

“I walked in with an open mind, super optimistic, and I pretty much asked for someone a bit different to Rupert,” she says. “I kind of worked that out day one at the wedding where I was like, okay, he's not exactly what I asked for. But everything I do in life I try to keep an open mind and open heart so I was like, let's just try to see through this and try to work past it.

“I don't know why they matched us. I never asked and to this day I don't know why they paired me up with Rupert.”

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The 26-year-old model went on to say that she believes the reason why they lasted so long in the experiment is because they’re both “easygoing people”.

“I think there's no perfect relationship, but I think there are three things you can’t look past which are politics, sex, and religion,” she details. “Rupert and I didn’t have those hard-hitting problems.

“I think our core as people, being two silly people that had a great sense of humour that took life lightly, that was our strongest aspects of personality traits that we concentrated on. We worked on the positive instead of the negative. But if I was matched with someone completely opposite, I don't think it would have worked out at all. I don't think we would have gotten past the second dinner party.”

Janelle Han

Janelle Han also shares that her partner Adam Seed, who cheated on her just a few weeks into the experiment, wasn’t at all what she had asked the experts for.

“I wanted someone who was really intelligent and articulate who could really speak their mind,” she says, quickly adding that she “wasn’t even trying to be subtle” with the dig at Adam.

“I definitely don't think we were a match. He got invited to the experiment quite last minute from what he had told me, so I like to think that I was supposed to be matched with someone else and they pulled out.

“The only thing that I figured out that was similar was that I had asked for an extrovert, but I feel like most people that go into the experiment are extroverts.”

Janelle recalls there was a dramatic moment during filming that wasn’t shown on TV where she broke down and questioned why she and Adam were paired together.

“I remember when the cheating scandal came out, I got really drunk,” she laughs. “Like, I don't cry, but then I f**king cried.

“I was laughing and crying and every producer came into my room and was like, ‘Janelle, are you okay? We don’t know whether to laugh or cry with you’. And I’m like, ‘Do both’. And I remember saying, ‘I can't believe the experts thought Adam was my match!’. Literally, it was so funny.”

Selina Chhaur

Season nine bride Selina Chhaur, who made it to the end of the experiment with Cody Bromley but announced at the reunion he had brutally dumped her the night before, says she had very little expectations of who she was going to be matched with.

“Apart from being a kind person and having empathy and compassion and all those things, the only aesthetic thing that I asked for was height, which Cody had,” she shares.

“We did get along really well, however, you do go in with an open heart and mind and I was just disappointed that initially he, I guess, wasn't open to the whole experience and experiment because of the way that I looked.”

Jack Millar

Meanwhile, fellow season nine participant Jack Millar believes it was “really easy” for the show’s producers to match him with his ‘wife’ Domenica Calarco because of their similarities.

“We had three really basic face value things that we could have clicked on straightaway - both vego, both love dogs, both Italian backgrounds,” he details. “They’re really really easy overarching things which were both built into our vows as well.

“And on a more prominent, deeper level, there was definitely a multitude of things that we connected on in different ways and we had a similar outlook to things and still do to this day.”

Al Perkins

He previously admitted he went on MAFS with the hope of being famous, and now Al Perkins has revealed the surprising criteria he told the experts he wanted in a partner.

“I was really simple with what I wanted. I was like, 'I just want someone that’s hot’,” he says.

“And they were like, ‘What about the personality?’ and I said, ‘I don’t care about personality’. So they gave me Sam [Moitzi], who is a really good-looking girl and a beautiful person.

“But it made me realise personality matters a lot more. Then when I went on Love Island and they asked me what I wanted, I had more to say like, ‘I want this this this and this’. Whereas before on MAFS, I was like, ‘Just someone hot and that’s all I need’.”

Olivia Frazer

Olivia Frazer, who had a strong relationship with her ‘husband’ Jackson Lonie throughout the entire experiment, says she “absolutely understands” why they were paired together.

“If MAFS is divided into stitch-ups or serious match-ups, I think Jackson and I were definitely a serious match,” she remarks. “I just wanted somebody nice and funny who is a family man who wants to have a family, so I definitely was lucky that I got that with Jackson.

“I was everything he asked for, he was everything that I asked for, and it was really good chemistry for a really long time.”

Hayley Vernon

Season seven couple Hayley Vernon and David Cannon had one of the most tumultuous relationships the experiment has ever seen, so it's no surprise the OnlyFans creator doesn’t think they were matched with genuine intentions.

“I went into the show obviously wanting someone that's nice, someone that's empathetic, caring and ticks all those positive boxes,” she describes. “But I'd also harped on about how much I really loved and valued my father, who is a farmer, and that I wanted a guy like my dad - but my dad is so much more than just a farmer.

“So they matched me with the pigeonhole farmer of the show. But also, obviously, everyone knows my past, I’m an ex-drug addict - his dad was an investigator with the drug task force.

“It was so chalk and cheese that it was not funny to the point where it was explosive and the simplest of things ended up being catastrophic and blown out of proportion because of our core values… I honestly believe because I am such a big personality and he was such a big personality that [we were] there for the screen time.”

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