Stunning tennis umpire Marijana Veljovic loves to travel and is on a mission to get more female officials into the game

STUNNING tennis umpire Marijana Veljovic loves to travel and is on a mission to get more women officials into the game.

Veljovic captured viewers’ attention during Roger Federer’s match against Tennys Sandgren at the Australian Open.

And even Eugenie Bouchard tweeted her love for Marijana, posting: “The umpire in this Roger/Tennys match is super pretty.”

Veljovic caught the eye when she squared off against all-time great Federer as he contested a call.

She has enjoyed a rapid rise up the ranks after receiving her gold badge for umpiring in 2015.

Veljovic was in charge of the 2018 Australian Open women’s singles final.

In 2019, she was called up for the Wimbledon’s women’s singles final before she umpired the Fed Cup final.

But Veljovic has stated her desire is to get more women into the game – and not just as players.

She said: “We don’t have enough female officials. We have three-and-a-half times fewer female officials than male.

“So there was an idea to attract more women into officiating and that’s why we did a workshop in Prague.

“We talked about the ideas to bring more females into officiating.
“We want to make it more equal because tennis is a sport that’s already quite equal.

“If you’re good enough you should be there no matter the gender.”

And she said one of the perks of her job is that she gets to traverse the globe calling the shots in the game she loves.

She added: “If you’re a fan, or see this as something fun to do… for me it was great fun to travel the world.

“That’s something I don’t think I would have been able to do on my own.

“To see the games, meet players and tennis legends – I would definitely recommend it.”