Boris Becker has been freed from prison and deported from the UK after serving eight months of his sentence.

The three-time Wimbledon champion was jailed for two-and-a-half years in April for hiding £2.5 million of assets and loans to avoid paying debts.

The former world number one turned BBC commentator was declared bankrupt on June 21 2017 – owing creditors almost £50 million – over an unpaid loan of more than £3 million on his estate in Majorca.

The 55-year-old German, who has lived in the UK since 2012, was expected to serve half of his sentence behind bars but was released on Thursday morning and deported, the PA news agency understands.

The flight was chartered by a friend, sources said, amid reports he was to be flown to Germany on a private jet.

Becker’s lawyer Christian Oliver Moser said the former tennis star “served his sentence and is not subject to any penal restrictions in Germany”, Sky News reported.

In May, Becker is said to have been transferred to a lower security jail for foreign criminals awaiting deportation – the category C Huntercombe Prison near Henley-on-Thames in Oxfordshire – after previously reportedly being held at the category B Wandsworth Prison in south-west London.

The six-time Grand Slam winner qualified for automatic deportation because he is a foreign national without British citizenship and was jailed for over 12 months.