Novak Ðokovic is the oldest child of father Srdan and mother Dijana. In addition to Novak, there are two younger sons, Ðorde and Marko. Ðokovic started playing tennis at age 4, and when 12 he attended the Nikola Pilic Academy (for tennis) in Munich. Ðokovic speaks Serbian, English, German and Italian.

He resides in Monte Carlo, Monaco, and is coached by Marián Vajda.

Tennis career

An up-and-coming player at 20 years of age, Ðokovic has already proven himself to be an all-court player with an abundance of talent. He participated in the 2006 Hopman Cup with fellow Serbian player Ana Ivanovic where the pairing narrowly missed the final.

He continued his great run in 2006 by shooting up the rankings. In May 2006, various reports appeared in the British media about Novak's mother Dijana reportedly approaching Britain's Lawn Tennis Association about her son joining British tennis ranks and the possibility of their entire 5-person family moving from Serbia to live in Britain. All the rumours didn't affect Ðokovic's play, however. He started 2006 ranked 78th, but with an excellent run to the quarter-finals in Roland Garros and a 4th round at Wimbledon, he found himself in the top 40. Just three weeks after Wimbledon he won his maiden title in Amersfoort without losing a set defeating Nicolás Massú in the final. Ðokovic won his second career title in Metz and with this victory moved into the top 20 for the first time in his career.

In 2007, his performances in the Masters Series events at Indian Wells and Miami, where he was runner-up and champion respectively, has seen him move well into the world's top ten. In those tournaments, which were his first and second Masters finals, he defeated fellow rising star Andy Murray in the semi finals without dropping a set in either match. He lost the Indian Wells final to Rafael Nadal, but avenged this defeat by beating Nadal in the Miami event, before defeating the resurgent Guillermo Cañas in the final (6-3, 6-2, 6-4). He later attended the prestigious Monte Carlo Open, only to be defeated by David Ferrer in his third round match in straight sets. At the tournament in Estoril, Ðokovic defeated frenchman Richard Gasquet 7-6, 0-6, 6-1, in the final. In August 2007, he was the highest profile player to agree that men's tennis had a problem with betting. He has garnered further success in the Masters Series, winning the Canada Masters. In the final he defeated top seeded Roger Federer 7-6(2), 2-6, 7-6(2). In reaching the championship, he achieved the remarkable feat of defeating the World Nos. 1, 2 and 3 (Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Andy Roddick, respectively) on three consecutive days. This is the first time a player has accomplished this since Boris Becker in 1994. Moreover, Ðokovic became only the 2nd person, after Tomáš Berdych, to have defeated both Federer and Nadal since they became the dominant #1 and #2 players in the world. His successful performance made Björn Borg state that Ðokovic "is definitely a contender to win a Grand Slam." However, Ðokovic's appearance the following week at the Cincinnati Masters, resulted disappointingly with a straight-set loss to Carlos Moyà in the 2nd round.

Davis Cup

He is good friends with fellow junior graduate (and sometimes doubles partner) Andy Murray, who was part of the Great Britain team that Serbia and Montenegro defeated in the Davis Cup in Glasgow in April 2006. Ðokovic got the decisive win on 9th April, by defeating Greg Rusedski in four sets in the fourth match, giving his team a 3-1 lead in their best of 5 series. He now represents Serbia, as the country gained indepedence in June 2006, and is set to play World group play-offs against Australia in Belgrade in September 2007.

Equipment

Ðokovic is sponsored by Wilson and Adidas. He uses a heavily customised Wilson n-Blade equipped with a hybrid of Technifibre and Wilson strings. Ðokovic also wears the Adidas Barricade IV shoe.

Grand Slam

Ðokovic's best showings in Grand Slams were reaching the semi-finals of the French Open and Wimbledon in 2007 where he both times lost to Rafael Nadal.

During the 2007 Wimbledon he won an epic match against Marcos Baghdatis in the quarter finals. The match ended 7-6(4), 7-6(9), 6-7(3), 4-6, 7-5 and lasted 5 hours, just 5 minutes shy of the longest singles match in a single day in Wimbledon history. In his semi-final match-up, he was forced to retire against Rafael Nadal due to a back injury and foot problem. His Wimbledon success helped Ðokovic reach a career high ranking of No. 3.