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Tennis legend Andre Agassi has shared a heartfelt tribute to his wife Steffi Graf in honour of their 24th wedding anniversary. The 55-year-old wrote on Instagram: “24 years with this wonderful woman.
Happy Anniversary, Steffi, you are my unicorn!”The post, shared on 22 October, included two photographs, one of the couple smiling together, and another from Wimbledon 1992, where they famously both lifted their singles trophies.In the iconic image, Graf wore an elegant off-the-shoulder ivory gown, while Agassi looked dapper in a black tuxedo, a moment that symbolised not just two champions at their peak, but the beginning of a long, intertwined story.
Match made in Wimbledon
Their story, however, didn’t begin there. The two first crossed paths in the early 1990s, when both were dominating the tennis world. After their dual Wimbledon victories in 1992, Agassi had been hoping to share his first dance with Graf at the post-tournament Wimbledon Ball. In his memoir Open, Agassi recalled, “I’ve had a crush on Steffi since I first saw her doing an interview on French TV.” That dance, however, never happened, the event was cancelled, and Agassi’s long-held admiration remained at a distance.
Years later, fate intervened. In 1999, their coaches arranged a practice session that would change everything. Speaking to Vijay Amritraj, Graf admitted, “Our coaches kind of set up this whole practice. I was like, ‘Why does he want to practise with me? He’s married. I’ve got a boyfriend. It was all a little confusing to me.’” At the time, Graf had no idea that Agassi was in the midst of divorcing actress Brooke Shields, something she learnt a few weeks later.That same year, Agassi sent Graf a bouquet of roses and a letter after their first practice in Key Biscayne. Graf told Amritraj, “We had a brief conversation after that where I kind of said that I've got a boyfriend and, you know, all I know is that he's married. When I heard about his divorce a few weeks later, I understood things a little clearer.”Agassi later told The Cut that when it came to Graf, “sometimes the universe whispers, sometimes it screams.”
He shared that during his divorce, Shields once put a picture of Graf’s legs on their fridge inside a heart-shaped magnet because those were “the legs she was striving for.” Agassi said, “That’s the universe screaming… it’s a bullhorn.”
Their connection soon deepened. By October 2001, just days before Graf was due to give birth to their first child, the couple quietly married in their Las Vegas home. In Open, Agassi wrote that they wed “barefoot and wearing jeans” in their courtyard, using twists of old raffia Graf found in a drawer as wedding bands.
Only their mothers and a Nevada judge were present.
The family of four
Graf gave birth to their son Jaden Gil Agassi later that month, followed by their daughter Jaz Elle Agassi in October 2003. In his memoir, Agassi revealed that both he and Graf privately vowed that neither of their children would play tennis. Jaden instead chose baseball, signing with the University of Southern California in 2019, a moment his proud parents witnessed together.Speaking to Forbes India, Agassi described Graf as “the hardest to win,” adding that the highest point of his life was when she accepted his proposal. In his interview with Parade, he said, “What has transcended everything has been the common ground we share and our basic approach toward life. It’s better to be lucky than good sometimes. I don’t feel like I have any answer to how to have successful relationships, but I do feel overwhelmed with the joy that I feel every day.
”Agassi also told The Cut that he had long “respected Graf from a distance and marvelled at her.” When reflecting on their relationship in PEOPLE magazine in March 2024, the tennis champion opened up about parenthood: “You go through a whole phase of them going, ‘Well, this makes no sense that the people are coming up as if there’s a big deal.’ And then they start to put together why it’s a big deal.”
English (US) ·