Ex-tennis player Boris Becker pleads guilty and says he fears life in prison.

Former German tennis player Boris Becker, the former world number one, has pleaded guilty to tax fraud and admitted he feared for his life during the “painful” eight months he spent in the UK.

“Of course I was guilty. I learned a hard lesson. A very painful lesson. I starved and even received death threats. In prison, we are nobody. We are just a number. I was A292EV,” said Boris Becker, in an interview with German TV channel Sat 1.

It was the first interview with the former German tennis player, now 55, since his release on December 15 in the UK, where he has resided since 2012, having served eight months of his two-and-a-half-month training period. a year in prison for tax fraud.

“On the other hand, prison had good things. We have time to think a lot, to think about the mistakes I made these years, when I had bad friends and when I didn’t know how to organize my life,” admitted Becker, winner of six Grand Prix competitions.. Peace, with what Including three at Wimbledon.

After his release and return to Germany, Becker posited that he would rebuild his life outside his home country, “maybe in Miami or Dubai”.

And the former German athlete was sentenced, in April, to 30 months in prison for illegally concealing or transferring hundreds of thousands of euros and pounds in order not to pay his debts after declaring him bankrupt.

Baker was accused of transferring hundreds of thousands of pounds from a professional account to other accounts, including those of his ex-wives, failing to declare his property in Germany and concealing an €825,000 loan and stake in a company.

The former world number one, who in 1985, at the age of 17, became the first non-predetermined tennis player to win the singles title at Wimbledon, declared bankruptcy in June 2017, as his debts were estimated at 59 million euros.

Becker has a history of trouble with the law, having been sentenced in 2002 in Germany to a suspended two-year prison term and fined €500,000 for failing to pay €1.7m in taxes.