Boldy's no Bingle! Meet the woman making Michael Clarke smile

Michael Clarke’s new love Kyly Boldy may be a model, but that’s where the similarities end with his former fiancee Lara Bingle.

Behind every great man stands a great woman, and in the case of star cricketer Michael Clarke, it’s new love Kyly Boldy who firmly has his back. Friends close to the sporting hero say the 30-year-old brunette seen giving her boyfriend a standing ovation as he made his remarkable triple hundred at the Sydney Cricket Ground earlier this month is responsible for Michael’s current happy state and resulting peak form.

The Australian captain, 30, is said to have fallen hard for Kyly, despite swearing he would never date another model following his intensely public and acrimonious split from former fiancee Lara Bingle in March 2010. So, over the past 18 months, he has insisted the couple keep a low profile, allowing their love to blossom away from the media spotlight that attention-seeking Lara attracted. “People call Kyly the stunning enigma – and the mystery is all Michael’s doing,” a close friend confides exclusively to Woman’s Day.

“He pushes that, as he’s so scarred after the very public and drawn-out break-up with Lara. He’s fanatical now about keeping what he and Kyly have together private for his own sanity. She doesn’t mind because she’s shy.” While Lara drove a flashy Aston Martin and wore designer clothes, Kyly is far more down-to-earth, conservative in her tastes and with a level head in regard to money and hard work, friends say.

While Lara made her name wearing a bikini in a high profile Australian Tourism campaign, Kyly worked her way up, starting out as a cheerleader, Big W catalogue model and men’s calendar pin-up. She has since appeared in reality TV show Temptation Island, and has an interior design business, Bold Interiors.