Tennis match brought Dokic back to game

MELBOURNE - Jelena Dokic reveals that it was a tennis match that reignited her passion to play the game.

The one time World no. 4, Dokic went into depression after a fractured relation with her father and had nearly quit tennis.

But she acknowledges that thereafter something extraordinary happened. Overweight, depressed and four weeks into retirement, Dokic saw a tennis match on the television in her lounge.

‘I said to myself, ‘I have to try and come back,’ Dokic was quoted as saying in Sydney Morning Herald. ‘It was mid-year, French Open, Wimbledon time. It was hard. I’d gained a lot of weight. I was completely out of shape. To be able to comeback in less than 18 months and play with the best, is extraordinary.’

Dokic’s performance at the Australian Open was likened to ‘Rocky with a racquet’. She nearly had world No.3 Dinara Safina on the ropes, and knocked out seeded opponents Anna Chakvetadze (No.17), Caroline Wozniacki (11) and Alisa Kleybanova (29).