A New and all-pervading influence has made its presence felt at this year's French Open, and Jelena Jankovic believes she knows exactly what it is. "A Serbian power or something, that wherever you go you see just Serbians," she said, with a giggle. "It's just Serbians all over the place, winning all these matches. It's just incredible."

Jankovic is one of four Serbs through to the semi-finals of Roland Garros in singles and doubles. She and Ana Ivanovic will take on Justine Henin and Maria Sharapova today; while 20-year-old Novak Djokovic kept pace by beating Igor Andreev 6-3, 6-3, 6-3 yesterday to set up a semi-final meeting with Rafael Nadal tomorrow.

In doubles, Nenad Zimonjic is in the semis of the mixed doubles with his French partner Fabrice Santoro and the final of the mixed doubles with Katerina Srebotnik, of Slovenia. Even if the very realistic prospect of at least one Serbian French Open champion does not materialise this year, it is still a remarkable performance from a country which did not exist 12 months ago.

The Republic of Serbia, which separated from its sister state of Montenegro last year, formed part of the former Yugoslavia, and, as with much of the region, has a history stained with unrest, violence and the effects of the Balkan War of the early 1990s.

That this small, war-ravaged country should emerge as such a force in tennis is extraordinary, especially given that Belgrade still does not have a tennis centre worthy of the description, let alone anything that rivals the Lawn Tennis Association's new £40m National Training Centre at Roehampton. No wonder Djokovic briefly considered jumping ship to Great Britain to join his good friend and contemporary Andy Murray.

Djokovic learned to play when they built three tennis courts next to his dad's pizza restaurant in the mountains outside Belgrade and was helped, between the ages of six and 12, by Jelena Gingic. Gingic seems to be the Serbian equivalent of Judy Murray and was instrumental in developing his talent and advising him to go abroad to Monte Carlo, Germany and, between the ages of 17 and 18, Italy. Djokovic knows how fortunate he was: his father Srdjan was a talented skier and footballer whose talents withered on the vine because he could not afford to compete.

Thanks to his success and that of his female peers, the situation is getting better. "Now it's good, but we need a tennis centre," said Djokovic, who broke into the top 10 of the ATP Tour entry rankings in March en route to winning the Sony Ericsson Open in Miami. "If everything goes right, I'm hopeful that by the end of this year me and my father and my family will have built a tennis centre in our country. We really need it."

Jankovic was able to eke out enough financial support as a youngster to get herself to Nick Bollettieri's Academy in Bradenton, Florida, a move which began to bear fruit when she won the 2001 Australian Open juniors. Ivanovic, like many players from developing tennis regions, benefited from grants from the International Tennis Federation (ITF), which funded her travel in the juniors as part of its ITF Touring Team.

The help from the sport's governing body was invaluable to Ivanovic, who suffered from the financial constraints of coming from a country more concerned with dealing with the effects of a brutal and bloody war and its late 1990s status as an international pariah than producing tennis players.

"In 99 when Nato bombed Belgrade in an effort to oust Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic, I was a little bit afraid. But then by the time you got used to it, you realised that they are not bombing just everything, just special buildings," explained Ivanovic, who trained in Basle, Switzerland. "So after a month I started practising and that was good because, during the practice you could not think about that."

"Around that time, it was financially a bad situation but luckily, a few years after, I got my first manager at 14. Also afterwards, the problem was to get visas to travel. Even now I have so many problems to get visas."

Now the days of scraping around for funding and arguing with immigration authorities should be over for Djokovic, Jankovic and Ivanovic. Instead they are fast becoming superstars at home and abroad, the sporting elements the burgeoning Serbian celebrity scene, which, for the last 10 days, seems to been centred around the players' box at Roland Garros.

"There were a lot of people, actually," said Jankovic, when asked to do some star spotting. "Yesterday, there was a girl who won in Eurovision, the singer, which was very great, also the soccer player Stojkovic - Piksi - a lot of famous people coming from Serbia. It's just a little group of Serbs, famous people."

Francisco Ritti Bitti, the ITF president, is not surprised that Serbia has emerged as such a force in tennis. Though it is a new country, it has a proud sporting history to tap into. "The legacy of Yugoslavian sport is basically in Serbia, even more so than Croatia and Slovenia," he said. "There is a lot of sporting talent, historically, in that region."

Even taking that into account, Serbia's performance at this year's French Open has been, in Jankovic's words, incredible. "I'm just proud of that," she said. "I hope we can keep going."

Making waves...

MEN

  • Novak Djokovic aged 20, ranked 6, plays Rafael Nadal in the French Open semi-finals
  • Janko Tipsarevic aged ranked 80, beat Marat Safin in the first round in Paris; knocked Andy Murray out of Queens last year
  • Ilia Bozoljac aged 21, ranked 118, a solid performer on the Challenger circuit
  • Boris Pashanski aged 24, ranked 178, has reached ATP Tour quarters-finals and been ranked as high as 55
  • Doubles Nenad Zimonjic aged 31, ranked 7 in doubles, winner of 16 ATP Tour doubles titles and a semi-finalist (with Fabrice Santoro) at Roland Garros
  • Novak Djokovic and (right) Jelena Jankovic, who have both reached the French Open semi-finals

WOMEN

  • Jelena Jankovic aged 22, ranked 5, plays Justine Henin in semi-finals today
  • Ana Ivanovic aged 19, ranked 7, plays Maria Sharapova in semi-finals today Vojislava Lukic aged 20, ranked 226, plays ITF events, winning three
  • Teodora Mircic aged 21, ranked 405, plays on the ITF circuit