Suddenly, Hingis Is Reborn in Melbourne

Martina Hingis may be down under at the moment, but she is on top of the world and loving it.

The devilish smile is there, and so is the twinkle in her eye that says she is raring to go, so watch out. She is No. 1 in the world, is playing tennis in a tournament in which she hasn’t lost a match since the quarterfinals of 1996, and is liking how she is feeling and how she is playing.

Her 51-minute, 6-2, 6-3 spanking of Australian hopeful Alicia Molik today was only part of the exhibit. It included 74% effectiveness on her first serve; 25 of 28 (89%) of points won when her first serve was in; only nine errors, and 26 winners.

That bumped her into the Australian Open round of 16, or, more important to her, a step closer to a possible rematch with Serena Williams, which would take place in the semifinals.

Serena is only one of the memories that represents a less-than-wonderful 1999 for Hingis, who has been among the top five players in the world since she made her second swing through the tour in 1996.

By the time Hingis arrived for the Australian Open last year, she had already won four Grand Slam events, two here and one at Wimbledon and the U.S. Open. And when she won again in Melbourne last year, there was no reason to see anything on the horizon except sunny days and blue skies.

But then she lost at the French Open, an especially galling defeat because it came at the hands of about-to-retire Steffi Graf, whom Hingis had frequently implied was over the hill. She left the post-match ceremony in tears and returned with her mother grabbing her around the neck and making it happen. It was a bad scene, a public crumbling.

She showed up at Wimbledon without her mother, her longtime support system, and lost in the first round.

Then came the U.S. Open and her biggest challenge: the Williams sisters. She played one of the gutsiest matches in women’s history in a semifinal, rallying to defeat Venus Williams. Then, after characterizing her feeling about having to face sister Serena in the final with her famous, “Oh, no. Another one,” she fought the more powerful Serena into a second-set tiebreaker, where she expected the inexperienced Williams to crumble. She didn’t, leaving Hingis stunned.

In the season-ending Chase Championships in New York, she lost convincingly to Lindsay Davenport, meaning that her tally for the year in events that count the most was an Australian title, losses in the final of the U.S. and French Opens and the Chase, plus the first-round stunner at Wimbledon. For anybody else, that was a great year, especially because Hingis retained her No. 1 ranking. For Hingis, ’99 was a downer.

She has lost only 14 games in three matches this week and has never been in any trouble whatsoever. Her next opponent will be Sandrine Testud of France, ranked No. 14, who won in three sets over Tamarine Tanasugarn of Thailand. After that, assuming Hingis can handle Testud, she would have one more match and then Serena Williams, which is where her sights appear to be set.

She was asked about the absence of Venus Williams at the Australian Open, and the floodgates opened.

“First, I heard that Serena wasn’t going to come and then, with Venus being injured, well, one of them had to come,” she said, taking a jab at the prevailing theory that Williams’ father, Richard, orchestrates appearances and does his best to keep the sisters from playing each other, even if a small injury must be made into a bigger one.

“They are like surprise--how do you call these things--a surprise package,” Hingis said.

Then, she added hastily, referring to Serena’s new red outfit, “But I love her dress.”

Seconds later, when rambling about strategy and staying in shape and the need to have time for your body to recover from the rigors of the tour, she said, “. . . .especially when I guess Serena is quite heavy and she lost a lot of weight I think since I saw her last time. . . .”

So, the gloves are off, and the ultimate street fighter, Martina Hingis, has already started to hype the rematch. That would take place Thursday.

Hingis is ready, eager, even a bit cocky.

“The best smile, they say, is the last one,” she said. “So I’m waiting for that.”