Stay strong Dad ...I’m on my way
The emotional cry from daughter of shamed tennis star Boris Becker as he endures first nights at rat-infested jail
THE love-child daughter of shamed tennis legend Boris Becker has vowed to stand by her father and visit him in jail ‘whenever I can’.
Anna Ermakova, 22, who was born after Becker’s liaison with a Russian model at London’s Nobu restaurant, said she was in shock at her father being handed a twoand-a-half-year jail sentence for breaking Insolvency Act laws.
She told German TV she hoped he would be ‘strong in this difficult time’, adding: ‘I’m really in shock that my father has been sentenced to two years and six months. I will support him and I will visit him whenever I can. I hope that will help a bit to get through the time.’
In a separate interview in which she referred to Becker’s son Amadeus, Miss Ermakova said: ‘I wrote a letter to the court to express my concern for my little half-brother, Amadeus.
‘After all, he is only 12 and will now have to do without a father figure, whom he will lack during a difficult phase of his development. It’s not fair to him. It’s going to be tough for Amadeus.’
Becker was sentenced at Southwark Crown Court on Friday before being taken to rat-infested Wandsworth prison, barely two miles from Centre Court at Wimbledon where the German won three men’s singles titles. He is expected to be moved to a lowersecurity prison within a few weeks and may serve only ten months if officials decide he can be released halfway through his sentence and spend four months wearing an electronic tag.
Becker, 54, who carved out a successful TV career as a pundit after quitting tennis, also faces being stripped of his honorary membership of the All England Tennis Club. Officials are understood to be angry that he wore a club tie to his sentencing appearance. His work in the future for Eurosport and the BBC is also in jeopardy.
Yesterday, his second wife Lily Becker, from whom he separated in 2018, offered support. Quoting from the book of Psalms, she said: ‘The Lord is your shepherd,’ adding: ‘I will always pray for you!’
Becker’s legal team argued that the father of four, who won six Grand Slam titles, had suffered enough since being declared bankrupt in June 2017, owing creditors almost £50 million.
But noting his previous conviction in Germany over a £1.4million tax evasion for which he received a two-year suspended sentence, Judge Deborah Taylor said: ‘You did not heed the warning…and the chance you were given by the suspended sentence and that is a significant aggravating factor.’
Becker was convicted of moving £390,000 from a business account to others including those of his ex-wife and then partner
‘When I see him next, I’ll give him a big hug’
and failing to declare his share in a £1million property in Germany or a bank loan of £700,000 and £66,000 of shares in a tech firm.
Miss Ermakova was conceived in a broom cupboard in Nobu restaurant in Park Lane a few minutes after Becker first met her mother Angela Ermakova in 1999.
Former player and fellow pundit John Lloyd, who worked as a Wimbledon commentator for the BBC with Becker, yesterday paid tribute to him as a ‘great champion’ and a generous colleague but said ‘there will now always be an asterisk by his name’.
Lloyd added: ‘Whenever people talk of Boris Becker, they will follow it by saying: “Oh, but didn’t he then go to prison?” It will follow him wherever he goes. He has made a terrible mistake and now he’s got to live with the consequences.’
But he said: ‘I would never turn my back on him. When I see him, I will give him a bloody big hug.’