'Pure snobbery': Jordan hits back after polo snub

The model Katie Price has accused the organisers of a prestigious annual polo tournament of being snobs after they reportedly told her manager that she was "not the sort of person they wanted" at the event.

Price, 30, who is also known as Jordan, said that she paid £6,000 for a table at the Cartier International at Windsor, which took place last Sunday. However, the event's organiser, Chinawhite, turned down her application, prompting the model to accuse them of "pure snobbery".

Writing in an editorial for a national newspaper, Price said she knew more about horses than most of the other guests, who included Emma Watson, who played Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter films, the shoemaker Jimmy Choo and supermodel Agyness Deyn. More than 35,000 people attended the Cartier-sponsored event, held at Smiths Lawn in Windsor Great Park.

"It's pure snobbery. However good a horsewoman I may be, I'm also a glamour model. That embarrassed the organisers," she wrote.

"Eliza Doolittle went to the races with Henry Higgins after a few elocution lessons, in Pretty Woman Julia Roberts went to the polo straight from Sunset Boulevard, but in the 21st century we have become even more class-ridden. Unless you are a toff or an aspiring actress, they don't want you."

Price, who married the pop singer Peter Andre in 2005, has been riding since she was seven years old, and now owns six. She was invited to the Horse of the Year show in Birmingham, in October, where she is due to perform a masterclass in horse training, and has also written a number of children's books about ponies.

The model said that the only reason she wanted to go to the event in Windsor was to watch the polo match between England and Australia, since she has become interested in the sport and wanted to learn how to play. She denied that her aim was to be "photographed with the A-list", and argued that a fondness for horses should not be the preserve of the upper classes.

She wrote: "Polo should be for people who love horses, not a media charade. It should be about the sport. Horses are a wonderful hobby, one that gets you outside and keeps you fit. They should be for everyone – little girls, glamour girls, working-class girls like me. No one should be excluded."

But a spokeswoman for Chinawhite Rock the Polo, the organisers of the polo tournament's star-studded lunch and after-party, said the only reason the model was refused entry was because there were no tables left. "There are some facts that have been misrepresented. Chinawhite didn't ever receive any money from Katie – the claim that we took her money and then decided she wasn't good enough just isn't true," she said. "She's also saying she gave us £6,000, but tables only cost £5,000. She gave the money to a third party to book a table for her, and they were unsuccessful because the tables were already sold out. They're clearly going to rip her off a grand, so I hope she gets a refund."

Price, who has an estimated fortune of around £30m, is thought to be one of the richest women in Britain. She started her career as a Page Three model, and since then has appeared on a number of reality television programmes, meeting her husband Peter Andre while taking part in one of them. She recently created her own range of bed linen. Her autobiography, Being Jordan, has sold more than a million copies.