WHEN Christian Karembeu left Spanish giants Real Madrid to join Middlesbrough FC last year, he could hardly have imagined the stir that his arrival would cause on Teesside.

Almost immediately, the player's supermodel wife, Adriana Sklenarikova, was quoted - or misquoted, as she claims - as hating the North-East and its weather.

However, although they are more used to the high life in places such as Milan, Paris and Madrid, the couple say, in the latest edition of Hello! magazine, that they are happy in the region.

The footballer and model, speaking from their temporary home, Crathorne Hall Hotel, near Yarm, North Yorkshire, talked about the North-East and North Yorkshire, their future plans, and their search for a home.

"I had everything I could ever have wanted in Madrid, apart from challenge," says the midfielder, explaining his decision to come to the Riverside, having won the Champions League with Madrid in 1998 and 2000, and the World Cup and European Championships with France.

"It is easy to win the title at Real . . . they have a special word for their culture of victory: madridismo. Coming to Middlesbrough was a totally different experience," he says, completing possibly the least complimentary reason ever given by a footballer for joining a club.

Of their new home, his model wife - who featured in the Guinness Book of Records as the model with the longest legs - says: "The Press tries to make out that I hate it here, but I love it, because it's so peaceful.

"Where we used to live, in Paris and Madrid, we never had any privacy from the paparazzi.

"Every time Christian came home from training, there was a car or something following him. In Yorkshire, it is like a holiday for me."

The Karembeus talk of their lives growing up in very different ways: he was part of a large family on the French island of New Caledonia, in desperate poverty; she comes from a middle class Slovakian family, and was a student before she was spotted.

Of their plans to buy a home in the region, Mr Karembeu says: "We've been looking for one. Three times we were unlucky - we found places we really liked, but we didn't move fast enough."

Ms Sklenarikova says: "We've been here for six months now without a house and we're desperate to find one. We would like a Georgian or Victorian property, or a modern house with character.

"When we find the home of our dreams, then we can start a family."