Andy Roddick spends a big portion of his time specializing in household life today, slightly than worrying about attempting to win tennis tournaments. The 40-year-old former world No 1 retired 10 years in the past with one Grand Slam to his title - the 2003 US Open - however having since given away a lot of the silverware that he received throughout his profession, he has already moved his life away from the pressures of elite tennis and has by no means appeared again.

Roddick has been married to mannequin and actor Brooklyn Decker for the previous 14 years and cut up their time between their major dwelling in Charlotte and an unique North Carolina getaway within the Blue Ridge Mountains with their two youngsters.

The couple are very pleased with their lot and one another, however Decker, 36, was sceptical over husband Andy's preliminary makes an attempt to try to meet her again in 2007.

Roddick, who dated actress and singer Mandy Moore from 2003 to 2004, first laid eyes on Decker when he noticed her on a Sports Illustrated TV present referred to as She Says Z Says on CNN.

Keen to fulfill her, the tennis star took the bizarre motion of asking his lawyer to contact her agent, expressing his curiosity in assembly up.

According to an interview with GQ Sports, Decker felt this was a shady tactic on the time. Justifying his actions, Roddick stated: “The only thing I will say in my defence is I didn’t do it all the time. The shooting of the shot was a one-time thing.”

Deckers's modelling profession took off in New York, however though she had some associates within the metropolis, she felt lonely. She determined to Google Roddick and located his entertaining post-match press convention after he was crushed by nemesis Roger Federer within the semi-final of the Australian Open.

Having taken to his sense of humour, the pair spoke on the telephone for weeks earlier than lastly assembly up in New York for a primary date. Decker stated: “We had breakfast the next morning. We did not spend the night together.”

Before lengthy, the rising mannequin was travelling to Washington DC to look at Roddick compete. It was the primary time she had ever been to a stay tennis match.

Roddick admitted that he was nervous for every part aside from taking part in tennis that day, however it was a complete new world for Decker.

She recalled: “Tennis to me felt like such an off-limits, rich person sport. And so to see him breaking racquets, foul-mouthed, this renegade approach he would take sometimes—I always found it really funny, cause it seemed to shake up the rigid world that tennis was. I thought he was very sexy when I saw him play.”

“She used to like it when I yelled at umpires,” Roddick added.

Less than 12 months after they began relationship, the tennis star proposed to his girlfriend of their resort room at Indian Wells, with Roddick taking place on his injured knee to pop the query.

The couple married in Austin Texas in 2009 however lived such busy lives that they may go two months with out seeing one another.

Roddick admitted: “If we hadn’t actually made that commitment, I don’t know that we get through that. I don’t know if she’d tell you the full truth 'cause she knows I don’t talk about stuff, but…”

But of their joint interview, Decker backed up her husband's viewpoint and even steered that his ego helped stop their marriage from collapsing.

“It can get in the way of emotional evolution,” she stated, “especially in men, but ego can also be a wonderful thing. With our relationship, I think that ego and insecurity about failing—and failing publicly—was very much a motivation to put our heads together and figure this out.”