Top facts about Bernd Leno, the Saviour

is a German professional footballer who is playing for the

club

as the goalkeeper at the moment. He also plays for Germany’s national team. Keep on reading to find more facts about Bernd Leno.

Bernd Leno was born on 4 March 1992, meaning that

Bernd Leno’s age

is 29 as of 2021.

Bernd Leno started his career at the youth academy of the local club SV Germania Bietigheim from his hometown when he was only 6 years old.

Top facts about Bernd Leno:

The first

fact about Bernd Leno

is that he was born in Germany but he is partly Russian from his father’s side, since he is half Russian, half German.

Bernd Leno Early Life

Bernd Leno was born on 4 March 1992 to his mother Rosa and his father, Viktor in Bietigheim-Bissingen, Germany. He has a brother, Daniel who is also a football enthusiast like Bernd himself. Daniel Leno is now married to his wife Viktoria and they have two lovely children together, one girl and one boy.

Growing up, Bernd and Daniel loved football and they would always play in their small town of Bietigheim-Bissingen in south Germany which is very close to Stuttgart. Leno was known as a very energetic boy when he was young. 

Bernd Leno parents

decided to let him spend that energy on a good cause like sports. He once said how football was so important to his family:

“Football was very important for my family, for my brother, and for me, it was our life. We always wanted to play football, to have the ball next to us. Back then, every toy was football.”

He played for fun and mainly as a way to stay active but at the tender age of 6, he decided to take football seriously and joined his town’s local team. The German team allowed him to learn the basics and to see if football is what he really wants to pursue.

Another fun

fact about Bernd Leno

to know is the story behind how he became interested in goalkeeping. At the time he started playing football he was a midfielder; hence, he did a lot of running back to the defense position to protect the backline.

Bernd Leno did this until he was 10 and then something changed his passion to goalkeeping. In an official interview with the Arsenal FC, Leno said:

“I used to do a lot of running back when I was a midfielder. I played outfield until I was about nine or 10 years old. But then one day the goalkeeper from my hometown club didn’t come to one game, so the coach asked who wanted to be the goalkeeper. I said to them, ‘I want to try and I was very good. Then my parents bought me some gloves and I never wanted to leave the goal after that.”

However, back then he was only playing for fun and with friends. It was later in 2003 that he decided he wanted to be a professional footballer player. He said in another interview:

“My first memories of football were my first game when I visited Stuttgart’s stadium. Since that point it was a dream to become a professional football player - and 15 years later I’ve signed for Arsenal. I can say I’m living my dream.”

The game that changed Leno’s life forever was against Bremen and it was his first match to watch ever. It was in Stuttgart and he was with his parents and his brother.

You could say that Bernd Leno had idols as a kid and he looked up to many of the greatest to make sure he can become great just like them.

“When I was a child, Iker Casillas was always my idol, but when I was at Stuttgart, there were many players, like Timo Hildebrand and Jens Lehmann. I watched many of Jens’ training sessions to learn from him. So yeah, they were my idols.”

He even had the exciting opportunity to train with one of his idols, Jens Lehmann who is the former goalkeeper of Arsenal.  When he was 16 or 17 years of age and Lehmann was 40, Leno got the chance to join some of his training sessions. Lehmann’s mentality during the sessions was what Leno idolized the most.

Leno said about Jens, “I remember idolizing him and Timo Hildebrand too, but seeing Jens close up was something else. He was so concentrated, so professional and that’s the mentality that you need as a professional goalkeeper. I enjoyed training with him because he was so good, so experienced, and gave me many, many tips on how to improve.”

Bernd Leno personal Life

Let’s dig into Bernd Leno’s early life and find more facts about his personal life. Since he is a devoted Roman Catholic, he has made the effort to visit ST, Peter’s Basilica, the Vatican in Rome. He even met Pope Francis which was “a special moment” according to Bernd Leno.

Just like any other young soul in the 21st century, he loves playing games on PlayStation but unlike his Arsenal teammates, Hector Bellerin and Rob Holding who would play shooter game; Call of Duty, Bernd Leno, and just like Juan Foyth would rather stick with his own profession and play FIFA.

His respect for his childhood idol, Casillas, was rather recognizable through his choice of the team on the FIFA gaming series on PlayStation.

He once said, “I always used to play as Real Madrid on PlayStation. Casillas was a big reason for that but Real was the team I supported growing up. As a kid, I often dreamed of playing for them, taking over from Casillas.”

An interesting fact about Bernd Leno to mention is his rivalry with

. Bernd Leno and Marc-Andre ter Stegen both were born in 1992, and their career paths have been the same from an early age.

Back in 2013, Leno said, “We were already rivals in Germany's youth teams. It's not uncommon that you don't become best mates and hang out at the seaside. But we respect each other on the pitch.”

Another fact about Bernd Leno that is worth mentioning is that he married his stunning long-time girlfriend, Sophie Christin.

Bernd Leno Love Life

The 29-year-old German is having a blast in his football future but let’s find more about his private life. Bernd Leno is now married to his long-time girlfriend, Sophie Christin.

The couple started dating on 15 August 2015, which is almost 6 years ago. After 4 years of dating, Leno decided to finally take the relationship up a notch and asked Sophie to be his wife on 19 June 2019.

Bernd and his number one fan, Sophie, tied the knot in a beautiful wedding ceremony on 11 August 2020.

To know about Sophie Christin, the first thing you may need is her age. She was born on 17 February 1997 in Dusseldorf, Germany which means her age as of 2021 is 24.

She loves traveling and she shows it through her social media posts of the different cities and countries she has visited like Spain, Italy, Greece, France, and recently Dubai.

She is a translator and speaks German and Czech fluently. She also is an animal lover and is an activist due to that matter.

The couple has adopted two beautiful dogs named Lucy and Poppy. Sophie works with a foundation that helps rescue dogs and finds suitable homes for them called Wild At Heart Foundation and has adopted Poppy from them. The couple currently lives happily in London in their beautiful home together.

Bernd Leno Social Media

Regarding

Bernd Leno’s social media

accounts, it is worth mentioning that he is active on the three most famous platforms that are: Instagram (

), Twitter (

), and Facebook (

). He has almost 974k followers on Instagram.

About what he shares on his social media accounts, one could say that he only has time for football and family. He usually doesn’t post that much but when he does, it’s either about a previous game, a training session, or it’s a picture with his stunning wife. He rarely spends time to post about personal matters or his alone time.

However, now due to the pandemic and the quarantine, he tries to promote staying at home more, therefore he posts more about his routine at home. He shared a picture of himself reading a book in his massive backyard:

“with a super exciting book, you can beat quarantine time. #stayathome” After this post, he immediately posted another picture with his girlfriend at the time with the pun ‘my partner in crime’ words changed into, “My partner in quarantine #stayathome.”

Working from home in the quarantine is hard for most athletes but not for Leno! Before being able to get back to the field and practice in an actual training field, Bernd Leno turned his backyard at home into his home office. With the help of his two cute adopted dogs, Lucy and Poppy, and his girlfriend, his practice never stopped.

Bernd Leno Club Career

The interesting fact about Bernd Leno is that he is known as the Penalty killer and started his youth career in his hometown club SV Germania Bietigheim in 1998. He stayed there until 2003 and his attempt to join VfB Stuttgart’s youth team.

He was selected among 200 other players who were trying to impress the coaches. He initially came as a midfielder but after a fortunate event, he realized goalkeeping is what he is most passionate about. After 6 years of learning in the club, he moved to the reverse team as his senior career in 2009.

That season he made a name for himself locally when he won the under-17 title in a game against Bayern Munich U17 side featuring David Alaba.

He stayed in his hometown with VfB’s second team for two years until he was 19 years old when he moved to Bayer Leverkusen on loan after extending his contract with

until June 2014.

Bayer Leverkusen

On 10 August 2011, Leno moved from a German third division all the way to perform on a

team. Only 3 days after the five-months-loan deal, Leno made his first debut against Werder Bremen.

He kept a clean sheet for his three first Bundesliga games in a row and became the third goalkeeper in Bundesliga history to hold that record after Dirk Krüssenberg and Heribert Macherey.

About three weeks later, on 13 September 2011, he performed amazingly against

in the 2011-12 UEFA Champions League group stage. When Bernd had just joined Arsenal, he did an interview talking about his first match with Chelsea:

“That was back in 2011 and Petr was actually playing for Chelsea at the time. After the game, he said to me that it was a good game for me and that he was pleased and excited for me, too. He didn’t need to say those things but I really appreciated it. That was seven years ago and now we are together at Arsenal – it’s crazy!”

After that match, he became the youngest German goalie to ever play in a Champions League match. On 30 November 2011, the transfer was made permanent with a fee believed to be around €8 million. He became a regular in the team.

Since then, he has only missed four Bundesliga games out of 233 league games. After many impressive performances, on 8 November 2013, he signed an improved contract, fixing his position at the club until 2018.

Things were pretty great for the talented keeper until a very bad choice during a game with FC Augsburg. During that match -only after 12 minutes of it- German No.1 learned the hard way that the world of goalkeeping can be a lonely place sometimes.

When the Bayer defender, Jonathan Tah, played a back-pass to Leno to clear up the field, he failed to control the ball and it found its way into the empty net.

After the game, Leno spoke to the press about his error and how he wished the ground would swallow him up: “My only thought was 'what’s happening?'. As a goalkeeper, you draw the short straw. Of course, it was a complete blackout on my part. The ball took an unfortunate bounce, I sliced it and in it went. There was no stopping it. These things happen, unfortunately.”

It was only a few days after being first called up to the national team but Leno, famous for his calmness, stated that he doesn’t think that a small mistake like this would cost him anything and he’s delighted to be called up to the national team.

Finally, on 14 April 2018, in a 4-1 league win over

, Bernd Leno made his 300th competitive appearance for

.

Arsenal

On 19 June 2018, Premier League club Arsenal announced publicly on their official website that Bernd leno has signed a five-year deal for a fee of £22.5 million but according to their announcement “the deal is subject to the completion of regulatory processes.”

Unai Emery, the head coach said to Arsenal FC, “We are very pleased that Bernd Leno will be joining us. Bernd is a goalkeeper of high quality and experience. He has been a top performer and regular number, one goalkeeper, with Leverkusen in the Bundesliga for the past seven years.

We are all excited that Bernd has chosen Arsenal Football Club and look forward to starting working with him in pre-season.”

When Leno heard about the club’s interest in him, he was obviously very excited and nervous but surely his familiarity with Jens Lehmann back in Stuttgart made it a bit easier for him to accept the offer and join the team.

In his first official interview with the club, Bernd Leno talked about the things that made him make this decision: “I think the history of the club, the fans, the quality of the club and of the team is so good. I’ll try to help the team to come back to the Champions League and to win some trophies. Arsenal belongs in the Champions League.”

“Before I made my decision, I talked to Musti and Mesut about it a lot. They both said that Arsenal is a big club and that I would love it here. I talked with my brother, my parents, and my girlfriend, and they were all very excited for me. It was clear that I had to sign for Arsenal.”

The young goalkeeper yet has the chance to play in a game and make his debut, before that he did a lot of training sessions with Petr Cech. Leno said about the atmosphere of the club in the same interview:

“Things have started well here and everyone’s been very welcoming. I think we had a great pre-season and I’ve really enjoyed working with Petr.

He’s a big personality with a lot of experience and he’s also a very good guy. I’ve got a lot of experience too, of course, but he has much more so I can learn from him. The most important thing is that we have fun together and we push each other. We are respectful to each other and I think we still have fun.

It’s very good here, the way we work. The coaches do a good job and the staff is very nice. The team was very welcoming from the beginning, so I like it here. I want to play; I want to be the No1 for the coach and I just want to improve for myself. At the end of the season, we want to get back into the Champions League of course, and then hopefully win a trophy in the process.”

Leno made his Arsenal debut in a 4-2 victory over Vorskla Poltava in the Europa League. His Premier League debut came in a 2-0 home victory over

. Initially, Petr Cech was in the goalkeeping position but after his injury in the first half of the game, Leno replaced him.

After Bernd Leno’s great performance in the victory, the head coach, Unai Emery praised him: “He is working very well with the goalkeeping coaches. I spoke with him and said the most important thing is when the team needs him to help us, to be prepared.

He did that on Wednesday and today also – and against Vorskla. We have three very good goalkeepers. Petr Čech, his performances for us have been very important and his experience. Leno can learn by staying near with Petr Čech every day. I am very happy with him. He has waited for his moment and it's arriving.”

On 25 February 2021, Bernd Leno played his 100th match for Arsenal in all competitions in a 3-2 win against

in the Europa League.

Leno’s contract comes to an end by 2023 and there’s never been a discussion over a new deal between The Gunners and Leno.

When he was questioned about his future plans, his answers were not reassuring to the fans: “At the moment it's not the time to speak about the future, I know that I still have two years left on my contract and I'm also 29. For a goalkeeper, that's not too old. I've still got some years to go.”

“I’m very happy at the club. I don't know what will come in the future, but I'm open to everything. Maybe for a new adventure or to stay at Arsenal. As I said, I don't think about my future because two years is a long time. At the moment there are no conversations with the club or anything else.”

Bernd Leno International Career

Back in 2008, the 16 years-old was called up for the under-17 squad and was among the squad when they won the title in 2009. He continued to represent Germany for U18, U19, and U21 before being called up for the senior squad. He made a total of 28 appearances before that.

His first call up to the senior

team was in October 2015 for UEFA Euro 2016 qualifiers which were against Ireland and Georgia. At the end of the tournament, he was included in Germany’s squad once more for the final game.

Next year for the 2017 FIFA Confederations Cup in Russia he was selected again and he only played one game against Australia. For the 2018 FIFA World Cup, Leno was not selected for the final 23-man squad, unfortunately.

Bernd Leno Stats

Bernd Leno currently plays for Arsenal with the chosen number of 1. A few months into the 20/21 season and Leno has already made 30 appearances for The Gunners. He has been playing for Arsenal for 3 seasons so far with 24 clean sheets.

Regarding

Bernd Leno’s stats

, we can say that he has only played for three clubs but he has made quite an impact on every one of them. The total number of clean sheets that he has kept divided by club is 160 out of 509 games.

So far, in the 20-21 season, he has made 42 appearances for 3.792 minutes. He has 13 clean sheets and has 43 goals conceded. In a game against

, Leno received a red card due to a comical handball outside his area and got suspended. Even though his post has been breached many times, he hasn’t made a single error leading to a goal. In the Bundesliga, he has conceded a total number of 287 goals -1.23 per match to be exact- and has kept a clean sheet in 31.76 percent of all matches.

In an overall ranking, Bernd Leno is number 269 among all players in the world, number 100 among all players in the Premier League, number 9 among all players at Arsenal, number 19 among all players from Germany, and number 10 among all goalkeepers in the world.

Bernd Leno Achievements

Let’s start talking about Bernd Leno’s Achievements with an interesting fact on his nickname. The “Penalty Killer” got his nickname from his penalty saving abilities.

In the 2013/2014 season in a Bundesliga spot-kicks, he managed to save five penalties out of eight which four of them were in a row. As of April 2021, no goalkeeper alive -whether active or retired- has beat that world record.

In the Arsenal Player of the Season award in 2019-20, Leno came in second to Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.

Other achievements that Bernd Leno has are The Football Association Challenge Cup in 2019-20 season, The Football Association Community Shield for 2020, and being the runner-up in UEFA Europe League for the 2018-19 season.

Bernd Leno Style of Play

One fact worth mentioning about Bernd Leno is that even though he is a solid shot-stopper, he has yet to improve his understanding of modern goalkeeping. Modern goalkeeping consists of defending the box and starting the play in addition to defending the goal.

The Penalty Killer has good reflexes on the line and is quite quick around the box. The energetic little boy from a small town in Germany is now one of the greatest goalkeepers in the Premier League. He has great positioning for short-range shots and especially penalties.

He also has lots of endurance, unlike any other modern goalkeeper. He once kept the net safe with a broken nose and was never hesitant to charge towards his opponents during one-on-one situations. His bravery to throw himself at the feet of attackers to make point-blank saves or smother shots is impeccable.

The lone fighter is always humble and less outgoing than other goalkeepers. Like many of his other traits, his calmness is inspired by his childhood role models, Iker Casillas. Bernd Leno is quoted on Bundesliga.com, “He's perhaps peaked now, but he won it all and has been unbelievably consistent. He's calm and no-nonsense, I'm the same. I don't have to make a show of myself to stand out.”

Another big strength that Bernd Leno has is that he follows his mistakes and tries to solve them in his pieces of training and next matches.

In his interview with Arsenal’s official website, he stated his opinion on how the world of goalkeeping has been for him: “The lone fighter. That’s how I have always defined the role of a goalkeeper. You train separately, you warm up separately, you are fighting for just one spot and then if you make a mistake, you’re quickly the idiot. It does mean that you are a bit lonely sometimes, but I enjoy that challenge and I wouldn’t want to play anywhere else.

It’s such an important part of the team and I like that you don’t need to be a showman to play there, you don’t need to be flashy like a forward or a midfielder. That’s just not my style. For me, the effective game counts. I do not need to jump through the box. For me, it counts that I hold the ball. Besides, I do not like running!”

Bernd Leno Body Measurements

Concerning

Bernd Leno’s body measurements

, the only information on hand is his weight and height. The blond gloveman is 190 cm tall and has a weight of 83 kilograms. There’s not much information about Bernd Leno’s other measurements.

Bernd Leno Market Value

Concerning Bernd leno’s market value, it can be said that his value has been going up but since 2019 it’s been decreasing. Until its last update on 18 March 2021, his market value was estimated to be €25.00 million. An important fact about

Bernd Leno’s market value

is that the number mentioned is not his highest market value.

On 10 December 2019, he held a market value of €35.00 million. But since then, his market value has been fluctuating.

Bernd Leno Net Worth

Joining Arsenal, Bernd Leno now has a salary of €5,720,000 per year. Meaning that

Bernd Leno net worth

is presently somewhere around €13 Million. Since he is to stay at Arsenal for the upcoming two years, his net worth is expected to remain stable over those years.

Regarding his car, Bernd Leno had an Opel 206 that he drove whilst he was playing in Germany but there’s not more information on his car situation now that he is in England.

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