MARIA Sharapova has opened up about the start and finish of her relationship with fellow tennis star Grigor Dimitrov in a newly released autobiography.

Sharapova and Dimitrov went public with their relationship after the 2013 Madrid Open, however they broke up in July 2015 and little was made public about their time together.

Until now.

In her book “Unstoppable”, Sharapova reveals how Dimitrov got in touch with her via her agent.

“I googled Grigor’s name to find his age,” she wrote.

“Was he even legal? Twenty-one. Barely. Give him my e-mail.

Grigor Dimitrov and Maria Sharapova in happier times in London in 2014. Source: Supplied

“I remembered noticing a kid walking through Wimbledon village, tall, skinny, and carrying a type of good-looking grin that says he knows he is good-looking.

“I remembered telling my coach, ‘Thank goodness he didn’t exist in my generation’, that would have been dangerous. Dangerously distracting.

“A few back-and-forths with e-mail, and Grigor asked for my number.

“Our messages turned into phone calls, our phone calls into Skype calls. It was very simple and genuine. I didn’t think too much of it until, after one of our phone conversations, he dialled me back thirty seconds later and said, ‘I’m sorry, but I miss your voice. Can we speak for a few more minutes?’”

“Within days he asked me if I would be his girlfriend. It caught me off guard. I wasn’t ready for anything like that. He said he would wait until I was ready.

“’I’ll wait. I know what I want and I want you.’ Weeks rolled into months and there was nothing that could stop us.”

However it was the way in which the pair broke up where Sharapova really opens up, revealing that the timing of their relationship was an insurmountable problem.

“Grigor recently told me — we were talking on the phone after he’d reached the semi-finals of the Australian Open — that one of the worst things in life is when you have the right thing at the wrong time.

“It made me think of an evening we spent before the 2015 Wimbledon tournament. He had reached the semi-finals the previous year by beating Andy Murray; he lost to Novak Djokovic in four sets in that round. He pulled out a book that Wimbledon puts together of previous championships.

“He quietly flipped through the pages of the book until he found a picture of me, in his box, watching his match. He looked at me, sad — I thought I saw tears in his eyes — ‘Did you see this? This means everything to me. Seeing you in my box next to my mother.’

Maria Sharapova watches Grigor Dimitrov from a box at Wimbledon. Source: Getty Images

“It was then, at that moment, that the emotional pull I had been fighting came to an end. I knew, and so did he, that I couldn’t be that person at this time of my life. I was supposed to be focused, getting prepared for my own matches, my own triumphs and defeats, on the largest stage of my career.

“I had been watching his match that day only because I’d lost early at those championships. So his good memory was my bad memory. What meant everything to him happened only because I had lost.

“Like he said, you can have the right thing, but it might come at the wrong time.”