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Slobodan Živojinović

Živojinović at Wimbledon in the mid 1980s.
Country (sports)	Yugoslavia
Residence	Belgrade, Serbia
Born	(1963-07-23) 23 July 1963 (age 55) Belgrade, SR Serbia, SFR Yugoslavia
Height	1.98 m (6 ft 6 in)
Turned pro	1981
Retired	1992
Plays	Right-handed
Prize money	$1,450,654
Singles
Career record	150–138
Career titles	2
Highest ranking	No. 19 (26 October 1987)
Grand Slam Singles results
Australian Open	SF (1985)
French Open	3R (1988)
Wimbledon	SF (1986)
US Open	3R (1987)
Doubles
Career record	151–102
Career titles	8
Highest ranking	No. 1 (8 September 1986)
Grand Slam Doubles results
Australian Open	QF (1985)
French Open	1R (1985, 1989, 1991)
Wimbledon	SF (1987)
US Open	W (1986)

Slobodan "Boba" Živojinović (Serbian Cyrillic: Слободан Живојиновић, pronounced [slɔbɔ̌dan ʒiʋɔjǐːnɔʋit͡ɕ]; born 23 July 1963) is a Serbian former tennis player who competed for SFR Yugoslavia.

Together with Nenad Zimonjić, he is the only tennis player from Serbia to be the World No. 1 in doubles. As a singles player, he reached the semi-finals of the 1985 Australian Open and the 1986 Wimbledon Championships, achieving a career-high ranking of world No. 19 in October 1987.

Tennis career

Živojinović represented SFR Yugoslavia as the number fifteen seed at the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, South Korea, where he was defeated in the second round by France's Guy Forget.

The right-hander won two career singles titles (Houston, 1986 and Sydney, 1988), as well as eight doubles titles. He reached his highest singles ATP ranking on October 26, 1987, when he became World No. 19.

Živojinović's most notable Grand Slam results were two semifinals. As an unseeded player at the 1985 Australian Open, he memorably beat John McEnroe in a grueling 5-set quarterfinal to reach the semi-finals (where he lost in straight sets to Mats Wilander). The next year, at the 1986 Wimbledon semifinal, again as an unseeded player, he lost to Ivan Lendl in a hard-fought five-set match.

Over the course of his career, Živojinović amassed an overall singles record of 150 wins and 138 defeats. He was much more successful in doubles competition, winning the U.S. Open in 1986 with Andrés Gómez. That same year, he won three more tournaments. He was ranked as the No. 1 doubles player in the world on September 8, 1986.

Career titles

Singles (2)

Result	No.	Date	Tournament	Surface	Opponent	Score
Win	1.	Nov 1986	Houston, United States	Carpet	Scott Davis	6–1, 4–6, 6–3
Win	2.	Oct 1988	Sydney, Australia	Hard (i)	Richard Matuszewski	7–6(10–8), 6–3, 6–4

Doubles (8)

Result	No.	Date	Tournament	Surface	Partner	Opponents	Score
Win	1.	Jul 1985	Boston, United States	Hard	Libor Pimek	Peter McNamara Paul McNamee	2–6, 6–4, 7–6
Win	2.	Mar 1986	Brussels, Belgium	Carpet	Boris Becker	John Fitzgerald Tomáš Šmíd	7–6, 7–5
Win	3.	Mar 1986	Rotterdam, Netherlands	Carpet	Stefan Edberg	Wojtek Fibak Matt Mitchell	2–6, 6–3, 6–2
Win	4.	Aug 1986	US Open, New York City	Hard	Andrés Gómez	Joakim Nyström Mats Wilander	4–6, 6–3, 6–3, 4–6, 6–3
Win	5.	Mar 1987	Brussels, Belgium	Carpet	Boris Becker	Chip Hooper Michael Leach	7–6, 7–6
Win	6.	Mar 1987	Milan, Italy	Carpet	Boris Becker	Sergio Casal Emilio Sánchez	3–6, 6–3, 6–4
Win	7.	Oct, 1988	Tokyo, Japan	Carpet	Andrés Gómez	Boris Becker Eric Jelen	7–5, 5–7, 6–3
Win	8.	Feb, 1990	Brussels, Belgium	Carpet	Emilio Sánchez	Goran Ivanišević Balázs Taróczy	7–5, 6–3

Team competition titles (1)

No.	Date	Team competition	Surface	Partner/Team	Opponents	Score
1.	May 1990	World Team Cup, Düsseldorf, Germany	Clay	Goran Ivanišević Goran Prpić	Jim Courier Brad Gilbert Ken Flach Robert Seguso	2–1

Grand Slam Singles performance timeline

• A = did not participate in the tournament


• NH = tournament not held


• SR = the ratio of the number of singles tournaments won to the number of those tournaments played

Personal life

Živojinović at Wimbledon in the mid-1980s.

Živojinović was engaged to Zorica Desnica with whom he has a son Filip. The couple broke up before getting to the altar.

In 1991, Živojinović married popular Yugoslav folk singer Fahreta Jahić known as Lepa Brena.

Though undeniably well known for his tennis, Živojinović's media prominence, especially in the years since his retirement, also owes a lot to his marriage to Lepa Brena, Yugoslavia's biggest commercial folk singing star ever. Their wedding on December 7, 1991 was a supreme media event throughout the then still existing Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The lavish ceremony took place at Belgrade's InterContinental Hotel with Ion Ţiriac as the groom's best man. The level of interest in the event was such that Brena's manager Raka Đokić even released a VHS tape of the wedding for commercial exploitation.^[1] Their very public relationship has been providing steady fodder for various yellow media publications ever since.

The couple have two sons — Stefan (born in New York City in May 1992) and Viktor. In the afternoon hours of Thursday, November 23, 2000, 8-year-old Stefan was kidnapped by members of Zemun mafia clan and returned on Tuesday five days later on the side of Belgrade–Niš highway for the ransom sum reported to be more than DM 2 million.^[2]

Throughout 2005 and 2006 there were numerous tabloid reports about Živojinović's supposed infidelity and bad state of his marriage. Finally, in April 2006 he reportedly even moved out of the family home following yet another argument with Brena.^[3] Though the reports of a separation were frequent and detailed,^[4] the couple are still together.

References

External links

• 
  Slobodan Živojinović at the Association of Tennis Professionals
  


• 
  Slobodan Živojinović at the International Tennis Federation
  

Sporting positions
Preceded by Yannick Noah Andrés Gómez Andrés Gómez	World No. 1 (doubles) August 25, 1986 - September 7, 1986 September 22, 1986 - October 19, 1986 November 10, 1986 - November 23, 1986	Succeeded by Andrés Gómez Andrés Gómez Andrés Gómez
Preceded by Boško Ivanović	President of the Tennis Federation of Serbia 2006–2011	Succeeded by Vuk Jeremić