Dubai: She is a contemporary of former World No 1 Ana Ivanovic and Jelena Jankovic. She has also been the under-14 European No 1, but now Serbia's Vojislava Lukic sees her time to discard tennis and take up a career in acting.
"I've done a course in acting back home in Serbia recently and I have been lucky to speak with Miami Vice lead actor Don Johnson who has promised to ensure I fulfil my dream of acting in Hollywood," Lukic told Gulf News.
What has happened in the past few days may well change the life of this bubbly 22-year-old. She came to Dubai with her tennis gear in tow, but with very little motivation and no preparation at all for the tournament.
"Since there was a place in the doubles, I teamed up with Bojana [Jovanovski] to see how far I could go," Lukic said.
Impressive player
She was impressive as the pairing made it to the doubles quarterfinals before losing 6-4, 6-2 to fourth seeds Julia Goerges and Oksana Kalashnikova on Thursday.
Not surprising though for the Serb as she has quite a record as a junior. After starting her tennis career at eight, Lukic went on to become the European No 1 in the under-14 category and climbed up to No 5 on the ITF Under-16 Rankings.
And this at a time when there were hordes of youngsters breaking into the glitzy world of women's tennis. She also played alongside Ivanovic and Jankovic for the Serbian Fed Cup team in 2007.
"I was always the No 1 player in Serbia. However, unfortunately for me, Ana [Ivanovic] and Jelena [Jankovic] have moved on, but I somehow got stuck behind," Lukic lamented.
Born on March 31, 1987, Lukic achieved her highest career ranking as No 203 in the singles in August 2007 and No 223 in the doubles in October 2008. But a sudden dip in motivation did not help the rankings.
"I lost faith in the tennis I was playing. I wanted to live a life that is more fruitful, so I turned to other things such as acting and a full-time job in marketing," she said. Last year, Lukic posed for the Serbian edition of the men's magazine FHM. Besides this she has already started working as a host on Total Tennis, the RTS television programme about tennis, along with developing her own tennis school for girls.
Loving life
"I want to do things that will make me happy," she said.
"I love my tennis, but I love life and anything that will make me happy. Anyone will be surprised when they hear that someone has stopped tennis at 20. But for me, I believe I can reach out to others by being outside the sport," Lukic said.
