Dokic plans to become UK citizen

Yugoslav world number five Jelena Dokic is planning to move to London and apply for British citizenship, according to her volatile…

Yugoslav world number five Jelena Dokic is planning to move to London and apply for British citizenship, according to her volatile father Damir.

Belgrade planning authorities have rejected an application for a large family mansion and tennis centre and Damir claims that a move to Britain is the only way to develop his teenage daughter's talents.

"She can't get the right location to build the mansion and tennis centre she wants, so we have decided to move to England," he told a Belgrade radio station.

"I'm fed up with all this mess and therefore I'm going to write Jelena off as a Belgrade citizen. I want her to become a UK citizen," said Damir Dokic in comments reported by the BBC.

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Dokic, 19, emigrated to Australia from Serbia with her family in 1994 but returned to Yugoslavia last year when her father fell out with the Australian press and public.

But Damir's memories of Britain are not all happy ones, although his daughter did reach the Wimbledon semi-finals in 2000.

The former boxer first gained notoriety when he was cited for drunk and disorderly conduct in Birmingham after lying down in the middle of the road after being thrown out of a tournament for being verbally abusive.

The following year, he was ejected from Wimbledon after smashing a broadcaster's mobile phone. He was later banned from the US Open for an outburst over the price of salmon in a restaurant.

The Dokic family's increasingly volatile relationship with the Australian media reached a head at the 2001 Australian Open.

Both Jelena and her father claimed the draw had been rigged against her after she was paired with Lindsay Davenport in the first round. She made a last-minute decision to play the event under the Yugoslavian flag.

She has never played Fed Cup for Yugoslavia and should she be granted a British passport she would have to wait 32 months before being allowed to compete for her new country.