The father of former world number four Jelena Dokic has revealed his daughter paid him nearly one million United States dollars last year, a report said on Saturday, calling it a ”divorce-style settlement”.
Damir Dokic told The Daily Telegraph he had received the money last year but that he had not spoken to his tennis star daughter — who is mounting a comeback after seeing her world ranking slump to 370 — in two years.
”She didn’t call at Christmas or New Year,” he told the paper.
”We want her to call. She can’t go on like this.”
The paper said the payment was ”being interpreted as a separation payment” to keep Dokic away from his daughter, describing it as a ”divorce-style settlement”.
Dokic also rejected claims that Jelena (22) could not afford to pay for coach Lesley Bowrey’s wages at the Auckland Classic, where she was unceremoniously beaten in the first round by unseeded German Julia Schruff.
”She can afford the best coach in the world,” he said.
”I have a copy of the contract that shows she received four million US dollars from [racquet company] Head and [clothing firm] Fila. The contract finished last year.”
Dokic, who was ejected from the US Open in 2000 for abusing staff about the price of a salmon lunch and who smashed a journalist’s phone at Wimbledon the same year, moved the family from Australia five years ago after accusing Australian Open officials of rigging the draw against Jelena.
He apologised for his comments on the draw and his attitude toward his daughter, telling the newspaper that leaving Australia was the ”biggest mistake of my life”.
”Yes, I am sorry that I left Australia and I’m sorry for the way I treated Jelena,” he said.
Jelena ended her self-imposed exile from Australia last month after blaming her estranged father for her decision to dump Australia and represent Serbia, where she was born and lived until 1994.
She qualified for a wild card into the Australian Open starting on Monday. – AFP
