FRANKFURT: German tennis star Boris Becker said on Thursday his new autobiography was his chance to respond to those who condemned a notorious extramarital affair with a model.
Becker was the subject of a tabloid frenzy after it emerged he had cheated on his pregnant wife and fathered a child in the back room of a trendy London restaurant in 1999.
Presenting “Life Is Not a Game” to the Frankfurt Book Fair, Becker said the book took on “those who took the opportunity to judge me and sometimes to condemn me and my family.”
In one passage, he says he was simply “looking for love, a feeling of security”, adding, “when you do not have that at home then you may look for that elsewhere, when the opportunity presents itself.”
The resulting divorce from wife Barbara Feltus cost the three-time Wimbledon champion millions.
Becker's first autobiography “The Player”, released in 2003, made headlines worldwide with its booze-soaked tales of championship tennis, luxury hotels and a string of female conquests.
The London-based sportsman said on Thursday that he found his fame as a tennis star and later on as a celebrity hate figure “difficult” and thought such attention could even be “dangerous”.
The book, drawn from interviews conducted over two years with German journalist Christian Schommers, was “a need to express my opinion, my truth, my views,” he said.
Becker claimed the work was an attempt to show the German public in particular the reality of his life today as a broadcaster and commentator.
