20 years on Seles still carries attack scars

The knife attack on Monica Seles, which took place in Hamburg 20 years ago on Tuesday, not only dictated security at sports events over the last two decades, but changed the victim's life forever. A similar attack must rank as every sports stars' worst nightmare and any harmless fan, waiting for hours simply for their idols' autograph, is now viewed as a potential threat by security staff.

French Open champion Maria Sharapova, who won her 20th consecutive clay-court match when she defended her Stuttgart WTA title on Sunday, is renown for having scores of bodyguards in the wings when she steps on court.

"It's not something I worry about, the security guys would be pretty quickly onto it if there was a problem," she said on the subject.

But Seles is the first to admit the attack robbed her of her self confidence.

She had finished both 1991 and 1992 as the world's top ranked female player and in 1990, aged just 16, she had become the youngest-ever French Open champion.

On April 30, 1993, the tennis world was at her feet.

Having won her eighth Grand Slam title at the Australian Open earlier that year, the Yugoslav (of Serbian origin) was still only 19 when she played her quarter-final at Hamburg's Rothenbaum in the day's last match.

Having won the first set against Bulgaria's Magdalena Maleeva, Seles was resting during a break in play when Guenter Parche, a 38-year-old unemployed tool maker, plunged a 23cm-long knife into her back.

Her attacker had waited four days for his chance.

His motive was that as an ardent admirer of Steffi Graf, he had been irritated that Seles had usurped the German in the world rankings.

After his arrest, he was found to be carrying 1000 deutschemarks (511 euros) and had a ticket to fly to Italy where Seles was registered to play at the Rome tournament the following week.

He told Hamburg police he had been planning the attack for weeks but only wanted to harm Seles, not kill her. At his trial, Parche's lawyer said his client lived in a fantasy world and his interest in Graf had reached an unhealthy level, fuelling his hatred of Seles.

Experts confirmed Parche had a personality disorder and the judge ruled it was attempted assault, not murder, giving him a two-year suspended sentence.