Glam lifetime of Mikel Arteta’s mannequin spouse – from Miss World contestant to CSI star

Earlier this month, a jittery Mikel Arteta was at home alongside his wife and three kids with his head in his hands.

He had just watched Spurs star Heung-min Son miss a sitter that could have clinched his Arsenal side their first Premier League title in 20 years.

Speaking about the ‘what might have been’ moment, he said: “My kids running around the table and going like this [head in hands]. I was. To be honest, I was. You can imagine. That is magic as well, to have the opportunity to be living it, next to your family and next to your colleagues.”

READ MORE: Glam life of Pep Guardiola’s model daughter who once dated England star

READ MORE: Meet Richarlison’s student WAG who ‘stole show’ at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium

Ultimately it was not to be for Arteta after Manchester City clinched their fourth title in a row that weekend with a 3-1 against West Ham.

But that didn’t stop the Arsenal star winning Best Premier League Coach at the Globe Soccer Awards yesterday (May 28) – with glamorous wife Lorena Bernal by his side.

And while Arteta is one of the most well-known coaches on the planet, his wife is famous in her own right, and below we take a closer look at her life.

Who is Lorena Bernal?

Lorena, 43, is very much in the public eye and on her Instagram, where she has 59,500 followers, she describes herself as an actress, TV host and a spiritual life coach. She is also the founder of her own group coaching event company called Live Love Better.

She was actually born in Tucuman, Argentina, but moved to San Sebastian in Spain as a baby.

Lorena later travelled to America where she worked as a model from the age of seven. As well as being able to speak Spanish and English, she is also fluent in French.

The model became Miss Spain when she was just 17 before being denied the chance to be Miss Universe because of her young age. However, she did finish in the top 10 of the Miss World competition.

She also worked as an actress and starred on several Spanish shows including Luna Negra and Lucia Quintana before breaking into the mainstream with things like Chuck, The Deal and CSI Miami. She also appeared as a guest actress on The Good Doctor earlier this year.

Meeting Arteta

Arteta was a young footballer at Rangers when he met Lorena – who was oblivious to his fame.

And the Gunners boss used a strange analogy about courting his then future wife earlier this season when talking about a struggling Kai Havertz.

He said: “I said to him yesterday, things are a little bit hard at the beginning. When I met my wife at the beginning it was hard to conquer her, I had to try and message and go and go. At the end she said, ‘yes, we want to be together’, it’s beautiful.”

After six years of dating, the pair married in Mallorca, and they now have three sons together, Gabriel, Daniel and Oliver.

Lorena often shares pictures with Mikel on social media and after he lifted the Community Shield in August, she wrote on Instagram: “Winning or losing, always supporting you. Although winning tastes better.”

And speaking to BBC Sport about his marriage to Lorena, he said: “She has changed my life. She has changed my perception about life.

“We have navigated many, many different situations, some of them fascinating, some of them really difficult.

“I have that feeling with her that we never get bored. I can be sitting there five hours, 10 hours, go anywhere in the world and enjoy and have fun and laugh. In our profession we always talk about the protagonist, which is the player or the coach or the manager.

“But what about the person that is next to that one? And without that there is not enough foundations and there is not enough strength for that to be consistent.”