Wimbledon / At A Glance -- Graf Gets Apology From Father, Who Admits To Brief Affair

A year later and a ranking lower, Steffi Graf has received a public apology from her father.

Peter Graf confessed for the first time that he had a brief affair with a topless model and said: "Without this whole story, Steffi would still be No. 1 in the world."

Graf's drop from No. 1 to No. 2 in the world coincided with the scandal surrounding her father. Model Nicole Meissner last year accused Graf of being the father of her child. But after blood tests, a paternity suit against Graf was dropped.

"My only effort was to keep these things as far as possible away from my daughter," Peter Graf told the German magazine Stern. "I did not want to make statements that would pour extra oil on the fire - and I still don't want to.

"But with hindsight I must say my tactic did not work. Perhaps I should have spoken earlier and explained the whole affair."

YIKES! COMMONERS!

-- The All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club, noted for its highbrow membership and royal box, is bracing for an invasion of 23,000 commoners today.

Because of rain, play is being held on the middle Sunday of the tournament for the first time since Wimbledon began in 1877. Tickets will be on a first-come, first-served basis with 20 turnstiles opening two hours before play.

Ticket lines were already forming yesterday. Officials expect the line for tickets to reach a subway station one mile away.

COZY QUARTERS

-- The remodeled locker room used by seeded women players has a few problems, Martina Navratilova said.

"They made it smaller. There's two cubicles to get dressed in. They put six bathtubs in and two places to change," she said. "The only time I've seen Steffi (Graf) this week, she was changing clothes in a bathtub.

"And they lowered the windows. I started changing and looked up and the entire stands at Court 3 could look in.

"But it is beautiful. You should see the fabric and the wallpaper."

SWEET CHARITY

-- Boris Becker is ready to hand over all of his Wimbledon prize money - and more - to charity.

He has promised to donate $525,000 to help a Romanian orphanage sponsored by his manager, Ion Tiriac, and the Greenpeace organization.

Becker, who has called the prize money in tennis "obscene," would earn $408,000 for winning a fourth men's title.

MILESTONE MATCH

-- Jimmy Connors passed another milestone when he became the first man to play 100 Wimbledon singles matches.

Connors, 38, shrugged off the achievement.

"It's just business as usual," said Connors, the oldest player in the tournament, after his 6-3, 6-2, 6-3 second-round victory over Aaron Krickstein.

Connors has won the most men's matches on the All England Club's grass, 84.

Three women have more victories. Chris Evert has won 111 singles matches, Billie Jean King and Martina Navratilova 110 each.

CHEERS FOR NO. 591

-- British fans crammed into the seats on Court 13 to cheer the lowest-ranked player in the tournament, Britain's Nick Brown, to an upset victory over 10th-seeded Goran Ivanisevic.

Brown, ranked No. 591 in the world, rallied to beat last year's semifinalist 4-6, 6-3, 7-6, 6-3. He is the first Brit to defeat a seeded player at Wimbledon since John Lloyd knocked off No. 13 Eliot Teltscher in 1985.

British fans roared every time the Englishman made a good shot.

When Brown walked into the press interview room after the match, he was even applauded by the British writers.

`AGASSI AND ECSTASY'

-- Andre Agassi has swept British newspapers off their feet.

Yesterday's newspapers gave gushing reviews to his opening-round victory over Grant Connell.

A sampling of the headlines:

"People's Champ, Agassi New Darling of Centre Court" - Daily Express.

"What A Gas! Classy Andre Conquers Centre Court" - Daily Mirror.

"Aah-GASSI" and "Agassi and the Ecstasy" - The Sun.

"A Class Act" - Today.

"Centre Court Warms to the White Knight" - The Independent.

LATER STARTING DATE?

-- A July start for Wimbledon? It could happen.

Peter Jackson, Wimbledon's media subcommittee chairman, said the tournament would consider pushing its starting date back a week to accommodate the players. Currently, there are only two open weeks between the end of the French Open and the start of Wimbledon.

The Women's Tennis Association and the Association of Tennis Professionals say they will consult with their members. No schedule change can be made until 1993.

MR. POPULARITY

-- French Open champ Jim Courier returned home to Florida to have fun and prepare mentally for Wimbledon. But the phone wouldn't stop ringing.

"I needed to recharge my batteries and I wasn't able to do that at home," Courier said.

"I just took the phone off the hook and didn't take any messages."

NOTES

-- Horst Skoff of Austria and Pablo Arraya of Peru were fined for swearing on court. Arraya was fined $1,000 for cursing at a spectator during his first-round loss to Todd Woodbridge. Skoff was docked $500 for shouting an obscenity in German after missing a point during his victory over Guillaume Raoux. -- Success in the tuneup tournaments doesn't always translate into success at Wimbledon. Goran Ivanisevic and Pete Sampras were finalists last week at Manchester (with Ivanisevic winning). Yesterday, they were upset within a minute of each other. -- Yesterday's weather: Sunny and warm, with a high temperature of 70. -- Jacco Eltingh and Richard Vogel made Wimbledon history by playing four straight tiebreakers. Eltingh finally won 7-6 (7-2), 6-7 (6-8), 7-6 (7-5), 6-7 (7-9), 6-3. The match was suspended by darkness after four sets Friday. -- The longest set of the tournment was the fifth between 1987 champ Pat Cash and Frenchman Thierry Champion. It went 12-10 as Champion won the match. They do not play tie-breakers in the fifth set at Wimbledon.

Compiled from Associated Press, Reuters, Scripps Howard News Service and Baltimore Sun. ----------------------------

TODAY AT WIMBLEDON -- TV - KING-TV (Channel 5), noon. -- Top men's matches

Stefan Edberg (No. 1 seed) vs. Christo Van Rensburg.

Ivan Lendl (3) vs. MaliVai Washington.

Jim Courier (4) vs. Arnaud Boetsch.

Michael Stich (6) vs. Omar Camporese.

Guy Forget (7) vs. Magnus Gustafsson.

John McEnroe (16) vs. Jean-Philippe Fleurian.

Jimmy Connors vs. Derrick Rostagno. -- Top women's matches

Steffi Graf (1) vs. Yayuk Basuki.

Gabriela Sabatini (2) vs. Andrea Strnadova.

Martina Navratilova (3) vs. Laura Garrone.

Arantxa Sanchez Vicario (4) vs. Lori McNeil.

Mary-Joe Fernandez (5) vs. Pam Shriver.

Zina Garrison (7) vs. Maria Strandlund.

Katerina Maleeva (8) vs. Patricia Hy.

Jennifer Capriati (9) vs. Wiltrud Probst.