WIMBLEDON : Lendl Going From Bobo to Boom Boom : Czech, Winner of Tough Semifinal, and Becker Will Meet for Title

It is Boris vs. Ivan, but the game is not chess. They are not tiny gymnasts or tubby weightlifters. To them, Kiev might be just another way to prepare chicken, and KGB a radio station. They do not come from Russia with love, or with 15 or 30 or 40.

They are Boris Becker, of Leimen, West Germany, and Ivan Lendl, of Greenwich, Conn. (and Ostrava, Czechoslovakia), two purveyors of tenacious tennis who will play Sunday for the Wimbledon men’s singles title that Becker won last year.

Boom Boom Becker, 18, brought his big serve with him to Friday’s 6-2, 6-4, 6-7, 6-3 victory over France’s Henri Leconte to qualify for the final again. Lendl, 26, won a war of serves and nerves with Slobodan Zivojinovic, 6-2, 6-7, 6-3, 6-7, 6-4, to qualify for the final for the first time.

“He wants to win this title more than anyone else,” Becker said, and truer words were never spoken.

Lendl has a lot going for him: a No. 1 ranking in the world; a stone mansion in Connecticut with state-of-the-art alarm systems and six German shepherd patrol dogs; three luxury automobiles, including a Porsche in which he has been stopped doing 130 m.p.h. in a 55 zone; a smashing girlfriend, Samantha Frankel, and nearly $9 million in career prize money.

What he ain’t got is respect.

Respect and Wimbledon.

Just Wednesday, Lendl had been grousing that he was being “chopped up” for any number of things--not smiling, not serving well, not moving well, you name it. Friday, he was at it again. “I think you just need somebody to pick on,” he said at his press conference, not 10 minutes after his 3 1/2-hour match, “and unfortunately, (John) McEnroe is not here.

“Next year, I’m going to pay for his ticket and hotel, and maybe he will come.”

This will mark Lendl’s first appearance in the Wimbledon final. He has met Becker five times in the year that has passed since the baby boom-boomer became Wimbledon’s youngest winner ever, beating Becker four of those times. Never, however, have they met on grass.

And the last time they met was the time Becker won. It was on a Chicago carpet in March, and it was settled in straight sets, 7-6, 6-3. Only Becker and Yannick Noah have beaten Lendl in his last 50 matches.

Becker had hoped to play his bosom buddy, Bobo Zivojinovic, for the championship. They are managed by the same man, Ion Tiriac, and often play doubles and practice together. When Becker asked if they would practice together even before a Wimbledon final against each other, he replied: “Sure. Why not?”

That, friends, is friendship. Lendl and Becker are not nearly so close. Said Lendl, in his usual delightful way: “We are friendly, yes, but we haven’t had dinner together. Make out of it whatever you want--you’re pretty good at it, anyhow.”

With whom Becker supped Friday night is not known, but before his match with Leconte, another close friend, Boris had breakfast with his sister, Sabine. Also among those with him this week at Wimbledon has been the West German president, Richard von Weizsaecher, who became a big tennis fan, oh, about 12 months ago.

Would Von Weizsaecher be here Sunday? Said Becker: “I wish. It is not happening every day that Germany has somebody in the final at Wimbledon.”

Every year, maybe, but not every day.

Lendl has been trying for so long. His luck has run so bad here that it did not amaze him when London’s two-week spell of sunny weather turned dark and cool before Friday’s match. But it was a bit much when, after breaking Zivojinovic’s service five times while being broken himself but once, the match remained tied at two sets apiece.

“I had a hard time swallowing that,” Lendl said. “I had to tell myself to hang in there, whether it takes half an hour, 50 minutes, three hours, even to tomorrow. I had to tell myself not to give up just because someone hit a couple of good shots in a couple of tiebreakers.”

Zivojinovic took both tiebreakers. The 6-6, 200-pound Yugoslav used a hot serve (17 aces) to overcome his few deficiencies and his raging emotions. More than once, Bobo let loose with a war cry at the top of his lungs, possibly in Serbo-Croatian, possibly in Cro-Magnon. He kept looking for an edge.

“Playing in the Wimbledon semis on Centre Court--I got nervous,” he said. “It is not easy. Everybody is looking at you. I was probably talking to myself.”

The only other man talking during the match was the courtside announcer, who kept the crowd laughing by mispronouncing Bobo’s surname 50 different ways. Zee-vo-yen-no-vich. Ziv-vo-jen-no-veech. Another-jam-sandwich . The poor guy was all over the place with that name.

A gentleman at courtside who annoyed Bobo far more was umpire David Howie, who, by overruling a linesman’s call during the fourth set, infuriated the Yugoslav and the crowd. The score was 3-3. Zivojinovic was at break point. Lendl served, the linesman called it wide (which replays showed it clearly was), but Howie called it in.

Although the crowd sided vocally with Zivojinovic thereafter, and although he eventually won the set, Bobo thought a service break might have rattled Lendl. “If the line umpire said out, it’s out,” he said. “If the ball was going softly, maybe you can change. But the ball was going 150 m.p.h. It was the first serve.

“This is the first time in my life that something like this has happened. I was really disappointed. It was an important point.”

Lendl, too, could not see how the umpire saw it that way, particularly since, “If it was in, it wasn’t more than a couple of millimeters in. The crowd obviously thought the ball was out, and if I had to make the call, I would make it out, also. But there’s nothing I can do about it, really.”

Oh, players have been known to do something about it by conceding a wrongly called point, but in matches such as this, that probably would have been carrying sportsmanship too far. Even in proper old England.

Probably, Becker might not have done as much, even for one of his chums. He did curl an arm around Leconte after their match and wish him a happy 23rd birthday, but there were no other gifts. The West German showed no mercy from the start, blitzing Leconte with four aces in a first set that took only 20 minutes.

Even Becker had to admit: “I overpowered him in the first set completely.”

More testimonials came from Becker’s friends.

Said Zivojinovic: “I think Boris’ serve is much better than Lendl’s. It’s faster.”

Leconte, who had to face that serve, said: “No one’s ever served better against me.”

Becker himself joked, to Leconte, that had he and Zivojinovic reached the final, it would take 10 hours for someone to break the other’s serve.

But Lendl expresses no worry. His own serve is classy, and his confidence is high. He has been practicing with a hard-serving friend of his own, Steve Denton, rehearsing for such opponents as Bobo and Boris.

And there is always the unexpected to consider. “You never know what is going to happen after we walk onto the court,” Lendl said. “If I start worrying about it right now, I will be a nervous wreck by 2 o’clock Sunday.”

The match will be televised in the United States, where Lendl lives, much earlier, of course. Czechoslovakia will be interested, too. Only one Czech male has won this tournament--Jan Kodes, 1973--since a fellow named Jaroslav Drobny won in 1954 while refering to himself as no longer being from Czechoslovakia but from “Bohemia Moravia.”

Ivan Lendl knows where he is from whenever he is here. He is a Connecticut Czech on King Arthur’s courts.

Notes Martina Navratilova also has made the finals in women’s doubles with Pam Shriver and in mixed doubles with Heinz Guenthardt. . . . The women’s singles finalists of 60 years ago, two-time champion Kitty Godfree and Lili de Alvarez, were invited to the Royal Box for today’s championship match between Navratilova and Hana Mandlikova. At 90, Godfree is the oldest living Wimbledon champion. . . . Jaime Fillol and Tony Roche reached the men’s 35 singles final.