The trouble with teenagers burning brightly is that occasionally they burn out. Jennifer Capriati did, Steffi Graf did not. This year's young offering on the high altar of the Wimbledon Championships has been Jelena Dokic, a prodigy, of course, in the long tennis assembly line of child stars.

The 16-year-old, who terminated the interest of world number one Martina Hingis - all of 18 - and most recently 24-year-old Mary Pierce, has blown across the top of the draw picking off seeded players with charming simplicity.

She is wonderfully made, loose-limbed and athletic. Her flapping skirt wrapped around her like a functional covering rather than a fashion statement has drawn the tennis world towards her as much for an unassuming maturity and lack of flamboyance as it has for her ability to take prize scalps.

But Dokic has not just appeared on the scene out of the vapours of the Roehampton qualifying event. Last year she honoured her adopted country Australia by winning the US Junior Open and ended the season as the world's number one junior. The players, if not the public have been aware of her ability, although even they are now surprised how far she has come.

Dokic moved to Australia from Serbia when she was five after her father Damir, a former boxer, decided to emigrate. The move came before the outbreak of war in the region. Little more is known about the detail of her family life as the media are requested to keep questions to tennis matters in the post-match interviews. Perhaps because of her age that request has been largely honoured.

The Dokic family continue to operate on a meagre budget while staying in London.

She has remained in the same modest hotel since the beginning of the championships. Unlike many of the top players who rent houses in the Wimbledon area for up to £5,000, Dokic is sharing a £150-a-night hotel room with her parents and younger brother.

So far she has earned only £30,000 in her pre-Wimbledon career from professional tennis, a miniscule amount compared to the top 100 players. Her current purse of £50,280 for these championships should ease the pressure, and with obvious added income from sponsorship immediate needs appear to be sorted.

"It's a big investment. You do not earn very much at the beginning and it is very tough," she says.

"Qualifying and getting to the quarter-finals is quite a good achievement but I want more and hopefully I'll go a bit further.

"Since I came to London, it's been tennis all the time and concentrating on every match. A lot of things have happened."

In a convoluted way she may now face more pressure than she did in either the match against Hingis or Pierce. Facing either Alexandra Stevenson or Lisa Raymond, who were supposed to play yesterday, Dokic faces a fellow qualifier in the 18-year-old American Stevenson and an un-seeded player in 25-year-old Raymond, also from the US. Stevenson's efforts have been totally ignored so far.

The whirlwind is expected to continue but the expectations are sure to be loaded on the shoulders of the 16-year-old in her next match and it is that changing pressure with which she will have to deal.

Dokic struggled in the aftermath of her defeat of Hingis. Both matches against Katerina Studinikova and Anne Kremer went to three fretful sets but when heavy favourite Pierce put her head on the chopping block, Dokic had it off in two swift sets.

"Beating Mary proves I can beat the top players and it's great for confidence, thinking, you know . . . you've got to think you are unbeatable. You've got to think positive and I'm really thinking positive right now," she says.

"Getting to the quarters in Wimbledon for me is possibly the biggest thing that has happened. It's going to be tough who ever I play next but I will probably watch the match and figure out what I am going to do," she says.

Not only playing like a seasoned player but talking like one too.