Hingis Survives Early Upset Bid

Tournament play started with a player storming off the court at the estyle.com Classic at Manhattan Country Club in Manhattan Beach on Wednesday and ended with the top-seeded player trying to regain her confidence.

In the featured night match, No. 1 seed Martina Hingis of Switzerland defeated Chanda Rubin, 5-7, 7-5, 6-1, in a second-round match.

Hingis has defeated Rubin in seven of their nine meetings, but after last week’s loss in the quarterfinal at the Acura Classic, she said she felt nervous going back out on the court.

“I felt like I had something to prove,” she said. “A loss like that takes a little bit out of your confidence and then when you play someone you’ve beat before, there’s a little bit of pressure you put on yourself. Can you actually do it again and again?.”

Hingis said she felt her rhythm coming back, leading, 4-3, in the second set. Rubin held serve and went on to tie it at 5-5. But Hingis rallied to win the next point with a blistering ace. Rubin fought off three game points but it wasn’t enough as Hingis hit a forehand winner down the line and later punctuated the victory in the second set with a deep corner volley that Rubin couldn’t handle.

“It was a long match and I put a lot into it,” Rubin said. “But by the end of the third set I didn’t have what I needed energy wise, she had more to burn.”

Earlier in the day, eighth-seeded Sandrine Testud of France defeated Dominique Van Roost of Belgium, 6-2, 3-6, 7-5, but not without controversy.

Van Roost stormed off the court after disagreeing with two late calls made by chair umpire Leanne White.

“My opponent didn’t have a very good attitude,” Van Roost said. “She tried to influence the umpire every time a call was close during the whole match, and went on to do it in a very critical situation.”

Trailing, 6-5, in the final set and serving at 15-30, Van Roost hit a long volley toward the baseline that the linesman called in but the chair umpire overruled the call. Testud complained and incited a debate.

Facing a double-break point on her next serve, Van Roost hit what appeared to be an ace down the middle as Testud watched it fly by. Once again, the linesman called it in, and the chair umpire overruled it. The crowd booed loudly, and distraught, Van Roost ended the game by double-faulting.

“She has no reason to be mad at me,” Testud said. “There were many calls during the match. Some go with you and some go against you. But I can understand why she was upset, it was a very tight match and those two points at the end made the difference.”

Van Roost said the umpire made a human error when Testud didn’t play the ball.

“I thought the umpire made the call thinking that at this stage of the match Testud wouldn’t just let the ball go hoping the umpire would call it out.

“Testud knew the ball was out because I saw her laughing right at the point of the overrule,” Van Roost said. “This is not the first time she’s done this. That’s just the way she plays.”

Testud admitted she was playing poorly and got tired in the middle of the second set.

“She changed tactics,” Testud said. “I got in trouble. By the third set I was just trying to hang in there. I was not playing well I was not moving well and at the end it was just a matter of who was going to get the big shot.”

In a later match, fifth-seeded Serena Williams, the defending U.S Open champion, admitted feeling boredom while beating Tamarine Tanasugarn of Thailand, 6-2, 6-2, in 63 minutes.

“I just didn’t have a good day out there at all today,” Williams said. “She just plays so flat, the ball kind of has a weird spin and I usually don’t have a problem with it but today I just wasn’t hitting it right, I wasn’t playing that great.”

On a scale of one to 10, she said her game was only a three. She won in only 38 minutes in a first-round match Tuesday.

“My mind began to wander a little bit,” she said. “And then she started to hold her serve and I was thinking, ‘OK, I didn’t want to be out there that long!’ ”

Fourth-seeded Conchita Martinez of Spain also advanced to the quarterfinals after defeating Alexandra Stevenson, 6-4, 7-6 (2), overcoming a 3-1 deficit in the first set and 4-1 in the second. Elena Dementieva of Russia also defeated Kristina Brandi, 6-4, 6-1.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Featured Matches

Today’s schedule at the estyle.com Classic:

Center Court, 11 a.m.

* Daja Bedanova vs. Lisa Raymond, followed by Amy Frazier vs. Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario, followed by Anne-Gaelle Sidot vs. Lindsay

Davenport.

Center Court, 7 p.m.

* Serena Williams vs. Conchita Martinez.