Tennis fans and the wider community are sending messages of support to Jelena Dokic amid some awful new details about her father and upbringing that have been revealed in a new documentary. The Australian tennis hero, who has become widely adored in recent years as a commentator and analyst, has released a new documentary called ‘Unbreakable’, adapted from her 2017 memoir of the same name.

The doco chronicles her life and some of the horrific treatment she copped from her estranged father Damir, including physical and mental abuse. Dokic has gone public with some awful details about her life and upbringing in recent years, and ‘Unbreakable’ shines a new spotlight on it.

One of the most shocking stories she recounts involves being attacked by Damir after she lost a match. “I remember he was so mad that he goes into the bathroom with me, locks the door, and he beat the crap out of me,” Jelena said. “He slammed my head against the wall multiple times. He was kicking me. My shins were so bruised, I couldn’t walk. He actually punches me in the head. And then I went unconscious for a little bit. He also stepped on my head as well.”

How father forced Jelena Dokic to turn back on Australia

Dokic was born in Croatia when it was still part of Yugoslavia and moved to Australia with her family at age 11. Representing Australia, she won the US Open junior girls title in 1998 and teamed up with Mark Philippoussis to win the Hopman Cup in 1999 as a 15-year-old.

She then shocked Martina Hingis in the first round of the main draw at Wimbledon in 1999 as a qualifier, bursting onto the international scene. She made the semi-finals of Wimbledon in 2000 and rose to a career-high ranking of World No.4, while also representing Australia at the Sydney Olympics that year.

But she was doing it all despite some awful abuse from her father, with cuts and bruises clearly visible on her body during matches. And in 2001 she was booed at the Australian Open after announcing her plans to change allegiances to Yugoslavia. Dokic has revealed it was Damir who forced her to turn her back on her adopted country, and she deeply regrets it.

“I would take 100 years of abuse if I could take back not playing for Australia for a few years,” she said on 2DayFM radio this week. “He took away from me, something that I loved so much.

“He took that away from me in that moment. He’s sitting in a hotel room watching this while I’m getting booed by 15,000 people (because he was banned from attending). I just wanted to kind of drop into the ground and disappear and never come back. I would take any abuse, anything in this world to not even just go through that personally, but that it didn’t take my people, Australians and my fans and everyone that always cheered for me, that it didn’t take 10 or 15 years until my book came out for them to know the truth and just how much I really love Australia.”

Fans rally around Jelena Dokic amid awful new details

Dokic played Fed Cup for Serbia and Montenegro in 2004, but switched her allegiance back to Australia the following year. She had a 14-3 record in Fed Cup and produced many famous victories for Australia.

“I loved representing Australia. I loved team events. Everything that had to do with team events, I always won. I had like a 99 per cent win rate. There’s a reason for that,” she said. “Fed Cup, Hopman Cup that I won with Mark Philippoussis. I loved it and I thrived playing in Australia and at the Australian Open.

“He (Damir) took that away from me for those few years. I wanted to come back earlier but I was worried about people’s reaction, even though I did come back three, four years later. Everyone did embrace me when I did come back but people still had doubts. They didn’t look at me as someone who was this patriotic Australian, and it hurt me because I was.”

Amid the release of her new documentary, fans have been sending well-wishes to Dokic on social media after learning some of the details around her relationship with her father. Tennis fans and the wider community have praised her incredible strength and resilience to overcome it and become the person she is today.

“It’s heartbreaking and I think people will find it hard to watch, there’s no getting around that,” she said last week. “They’ll find it horrific and very difficult and disturbing, but that’s what it’s about. We have to tell the hard stories. The day that we stop doing that, our lives and what we’re trying to achieve to change the world stops.”

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