Hingis Returns To Doubles For Her Love Of The Sport: No Singles Planned

Written by: Bob Larson Tennis on 1st August 2013

Southern California Open tennis tournament

Hingis Returns To Doubles For Her Love Of The Sport: No Singles Planned

epa03809352 Martina Hingis from Switzerland in action with doubles partner Daniela Hantuchova (not pictured) of Slovakia during their doubles match against Darija Jurak from Croatia and Julia Georges from Germany at the Southern California Open tennis tournament in Carlsbad, California, USA, 31 July 2013. Hingis won her first comeback match after retiring from tennis six years ago. EPA/MICHAEL NELSON |

Don’t even suggest to Martina Hingis that she has decided to come back in doubles is because she wants the world’s eyes back upon her. The former No. 1, who returned to play at the Southern California Open and scored and easy win with her partner Slovak Daniela Hantuchova, says it has nothing to do with missing the limelight.

“I love to play tennis but I don’t enjoy doing media all other things – if the tournament would be in my backyard I would prefer it that way,” she said. “I love the competition and I love World TeamTennis and if there were more Team Tennis I would do that but this is the closest to it and the now the sets are short and there’s a super tiebreaker so it’s it easier on the body as well.”

Until Wednesday night Hingis has not played a WTA-level match since the fall of 2007. But she hit one spectacular winner after another on Wednesday night and appears primed for another run at the No 1 doubles rankings.

There are a number of players inside the WTA’s top 10 in doubles that are around the 32-year-old’s age.

“It’s different as when we used to play there were so many more singles girls who played doubles: the [Williams] sisters, me, Anna [Kournikova] and Lindsay [Davenport],” she said. “There were like six to eight of the top 10 who played doubles. Now it’s just a few girls in the top 10 who play doubles. There is much more of an opening now.”

Hingis and Hantuchova are scheduled to play this week, as well as in Toronto, Cincinnati and the US Open, but the Swiss says that she will not play New Haven, as previously announced by the tournament.

The Swiss say that she has no concrete plans for the fall. Her future schedule will depend on her results during the next six weeks.

“If it’s a complete disaster, I would not want to continue, but I hope that’s not the case,” Hingis said. “I don’t have any expectations, but I wouldn’t put myself in this position if I didn’t feel that I couldn’t compete at this level. In [World] TeamTennis I was good enough, but is it good enough to be able compete at this level? We’ll see.”

This is former No. 1 singles player Hingis’s second comeback. She retired burnt out and injured in 2002 after winning five Grand Slam singles titles. She returned to full time play again in 2006 and had reasonable success, but she stopped again in 2007 due to more injuries and because she was hit with a suspension by the ITF for testing positive for cocaine use.

She says that there is no singles return in the cards now, even though she would not completely rule it out.

“Not at this point,” she said. “That’s a different world. Even TeamTennis [where she has played singles in shortened format and was the MVP] is brutal. You have to put so much effort into it. Playing tournaments is the easy part, but it’s all the behind the scenes training that people don’t see, the 6-8 hours of training and really the older you get, the harder it gets. I wouldn’t want to come out and play one or two matches and lose in third round. That’s not my type of personality.”

Hantuchova said that it was she who contacted Hingis to play on tour again. However, Hingis added that at Wimbledon, she asked her doubles partner in the seniors, Lindsay Davenport, to play with her in WTA events, but the American told her “’I’m pregnant again,’ and I said, OK great!”

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superslamtennis says:

August 1, 2013 at 11:29 am

RT @10sBalls_com: Hingis Returns To Doubles For Her Love Of The Sport: No Singles Planned: Don’t even suggest to Martin… http://t.co/D2Em…