‘She Has No Idea How Much She Helped Me’ – Boris Becker Shares Intricate Details About His Lesser-Known Friendship With Steffi Graf

Boris Becker and Steffi Graf dominated the racket sport in the 1980s and 90s. Both of them left the Baden provinces in the mid-1980s to put Germany on the maps of the tennis world. Becker and Graf won multiple Grand Slam titles in their career. But if asked to single out one, their triumph at the 1989 Wimbledon Championships stands tall in the history of German sports. But do you know how Steffi Graf once helped Boris Becker at the darkest point in his career?

Let’s have a closer look at the Boris Becker-Steffi Graf friendship through the pages of “Boris Becker. The Player” (autobiography of Boris Becker). Here he shared the lesser-known facts about his bonding with the German women’s tennis star.

‘As a woman, she fascinated me’ -Boris Becker on Steffi Graf

Becker wrote about the enormous pressure both of them had during the early stages of their career. He revealed how they used to take the same boat to travel from Bruhl and Leimen to Wimbledon and back. Becker wrote about his fascination with Graf. He explained the curiosities he had to know about the secrets of her success. “As a woman, she fascinated me. It wasn’t the infantile falling in love of a teenager that made me want to get to know Steffi better. It was a deep feeling of affection, an unexpressed understanding between like-minded people who shared the same fate,” Becker

Recalling an instance from his second-round loss to Peter Dohan at Wimbledon in 1987 he revealed how Steffi Graf stood beside him when others called his defeat ‘I saw it coming.‘ He added, “Steffi, good soul, had watched parts of the first and second set before her match against Laura Gildemeister.“

“She was sure I’d make it. She heard the noise that came from our court, across from hers and Laura’s – the applause – and she was in no doubt: ‘They’re behind Boris. He’s winning.’ The victor, however, was Peter, not Boris. The players – such as Edberg, who’d followed my defeat on the television in the changing room – were ‘shocked’. You can’t expect sympathy in our business, however. The Becker obstacle had been cleared out of the way. Only Steffi had consoling words for me. To this day she has no idea how much she helped me,” Boris Becker.

READ MORE: Boris Becker Revealed How His Ice-Cold ‘Comrade’ Steffi Graf’s Devastating Personal Moment Led to Her Retirement

Although Becker has heaped praise on Steffi Graf several times, his relationship with Graf’s husband and fellow tennis star, Andre Agassi wasn’t that great. Both of them have been engaged in some fierce battles in the past.

‘He said some things that bothered me on a very personal level’- Andre Agassi on Becker 

The duo met each other 14 times in their career, although Agassi leads the H2H race with a 10-4 margin. But the US Open in 1995 took their rivalry to the next level when Agassi was spotted having a post-match handshake with his German rival without looking at his eyes. 

When asked about the strange gesture, Agassi explained, “After he beat me this year at Wimbledon, he said some things that bothered me on a very personal level. It is hard for me to respect anybody who is going to beat me and say so many things that are not only wrong but meant to hurt.“

Both of them have been in the middle of many such controversial moments during their past encounters. Share which one is your favorite moment from the Boris Becker-Andre Agassi clash.

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