Tennis pro Boris Becker confirms split from wife Lilly after nine years of marriage

Boris Becker and his wife Lilly have announced they decided to call time on their nine year marriage.

The sad news were confirmed by a Berlin lawyer for the couple, who have been together for 13 years, revealing that they decided to separate, in a statement to German newspaper Bild on Tuesday.

Lawyer Christian-Oliver Moser said: ‘The decision after a 13-year-long relationship and nine years of marriage wasn't an easy one.’

The lawyer added that the couple's main concern was their eight-year-old son, Amadeus, and insisted that their separation was ‘amicable.’

News of the split comes after the couple were spotted out without their wedding rings on. While Boris was seen at Roland Garros in Paris, Lilly – who has ‘Mrs B’ tattooed on her ring finger – was spotted during a food shop in London.

Back in March this year, Lilly opened up about the couple’s rough patch before claiming that they were now ‘doing good’.

‘I've had a rough year,' she explained to The Daily Mail. 'At first, I let go completely — in every way.

'Too much drinking, too much smoking, too much going out and not caring. I thought: my life sucks and I'm going to die.

‘I turned to vodka. I was smoking a pack a day. Boris was going through a bad time in his way, so he didn't notice. We disconnected and went our own ways.'

Lilly continued: 'We did couples' therapy. It was something we never thought we would have to do. It helped. We did an hour a day for five days a week. It was nice to have the input from someone on the outside who doesn't know you and isn't biased.

'If you go through a really s****y time, I'm convinced you have to go through it in your way and hit rock bottom before you can come back. That's what happened to me.'

The former world number one tennis player married his second wife Lilly in Switzerland in 2009 and welcomed their son, Amadeus, the following year.

Boris is also a father to three children from previous relationships - sons Noah, 23, and Elias, 17, from his marriage to first wife Barbara, and daughter Anna, 17, with Russian model Angela Ermakova.