Becker tells of cupboard love

He reveals that the episode took place in June 1999 after his then-wife Barbara had checked herself into a hospital thinking she was giving birth prematurely to their second son.

Becker, 35, said that he and his wife, who was seven months pregnant, had been arguing in their hotel before she complained of pain and checked herself into hospital.

In the first instalment of his autobiography Stay A Moment Longer, serialised in German newspaper Bild today, Becker, who says in the book that he doesn't think "men were made for monogamy", "fell out into the night".

He says he arrived at Nobu restaurant where he spotted Russian emigré ngela Ermakowa, who he had noticed two weeks earlier. He writes that "she had looked directly at me two seconds longer, the look of the hunter that said,: 'I want you.'

He goes on: "A little while later she left her table for the toilet. I followed behind. Five minutes small talk and then straight away in to the nearest possible place and down to business."

Afterwards, Becker says, he "went and had another beer, paid and went back to my hotel. As there wasn't any news from the hospital I went to bed around 2am."

The result of the encounter was a baby daughter called Anna who is now three. A DNA test ordered by London's High Court proved conclusively Boris was the father.

In February the following year Becker says his secretary handed him a fax in his Munich office. It read: "Dear Herr Becker, We met in Nobu in London. The result of that meeting is now eight months old."

Becker writes on: "I didn't have a clue what I should do. But I knew she was saying: 'In one month's time I am going to have a child. I felt the ground shift under my feet.

"We began telephoning each week.. No one in my circle knew about this.. I flew to London and met secretly with this woman in a hotel.

"Before was a heavily pregnant woman. The tone in her voice was clear: if I wasn't prepared to accept responsibility she would make public what had happened and I would end up like Mick Jagger who was in the papers over his love child with a Brazilian model. On 22 March in the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital a baby called Anna came into the world. In the meantime I had engaged detectives from the Pinkerton agency to find out information on the mother who said she had worked as a waitress and a photographer.

"Two months later came the reply: I shouldn't continue with the enquiries because they would be dangerous. The media reported later of dark machinations and connections to the underworld.

"And this was a signal to me to stop snuffling around. Therefore I decided to accept this child if the doctors said she was really mine. I had taken a jump into an uncomfortable situation. It wasn't a crime but I didn't want to be blackmailed if she wasn't mine.

Becker tells of his "great shame" and his confession to Barbara, which resulted in their split in late 2000. He also describes visiting Anna in London. "I stepped into [Anna's] home with mixed feelings. But Anna was completely normal.

"She didn't jump on me but she had trust. For over an hour we played together."