Miscellany

Valerie Tetreault has retired. Tetreault, who became a professional tennis player only four years ago, said, in her announcement: "I still have the same passion for my sport I have always had, but I am ready to take on new challenges, all while maintaining a more stable lifestyle." Tetreault, who lives in Canada, will seek a career in communications, and plans to remain involved in tennis.

Martina Navratilova, who had to come down off of Mount Kilimanjaro because of pulmonary edema, was discharged from the hospital on Sunday. 18 of the 27 Laureus fundraisers reached the top of the mountain. Navratilova reports that she is feeling much better.

Agnes Szavay, who sustained a left thigh strain in September, will not be playing in any of the 2011 Australian tournaments, including the Australian Open. Szavay has not yet begun training for the season. She plans to play for the Hungarian Fed Cup team in February.

On Friday, December 10, Martina Hingis married Frenchman Thibault Hutlin in Paris. Hutlin is a showjumper; he and Hingis met earlier this year at a jumping event in St. Tropez. The former tour star, who won five majors, is an experienced competitive equestrian.

Steve Flink's choice for WTA Match of the Year is the Brisbane final between Kim Clijsters and Justine Henin.

Clijsters and Henin, by the way, say that they may form a doubles team for the 2012 Olympic Games.

So maybe she really means it this time?

Earlier today, I wrote about Martina Hingis's renewed contemplation of a return in doubles. Well, it could be more than just talk this time.

Miscellany

Ravi Ubha comments briefly on all of the Wimbledon seeds.

Serena Williams' Wimbledon Ball dress beautifully matched the gold and silver of the Venus Rosewater dish.

Vera Zvonareva is back in the top 10; the Wimbledon runner-up is now number 9 in the world. 

Peng Shuai, out for a considerable time with illness, has returned to the tour.

Over the weekend, Martina Hingis played doubles with Sarah Borwell in World Team Tennis competition. Hingis plays for the New York Buzz.

Miscellany

The BNP Paribas Showdown for the Billie Jean King Cup, held in Madison Square Garden in 2009 and 2010, will be replaced in 2011 by a match between Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi. Prior to the match, there will be a one-set exhibition match played by John McEnroe and Ivan Lendl.

Venus and Serena Williams were each fined $4,000 for failure to appear at a post-doubles match press conference at Wimbledon. Serena said today she was not aware there was a press conference--that generally, the team is simply asked to deliver a statement to the press.

The Fed Cup final between the USA and Italy will be held November 6 and 7 at the San Diego Sport Arena.

Sabine Lisicki has returned to the court to practice after a long injury layoff.

World Team Tennis competition begins on July 5. Martina Hingis will be playing for the New York Buzz, whose first match will be played against the Philadelphia Freedoms.

While you wait for the semifinals

Some Spice Girls memories...

Anna and Martina meet the press

Here is an excerpt from the wonderful joint interview done by Anna Kournikova and Martina Hingis. It's the best joint interview I've seen since Chris and Martina did their hilarious--and touching--interview in Charleston in 2008.

Anna: Even to prepare for the specific tournament, the last two months, I've had to have therapy, like real therapy, every day for an hour, hour and a half. This is just for kind of the fun matches. I would have to live in the trainer's room for three hours every day. I have five different things wrong with my back from two herniated discs.
Martina: It's a good day off tomorrow.
Anna: From two herniated discs to four cracks that I have. The right side is smaller than the left side.
Martina: I don't want to hear it.
Anna: All kinds of weird stuff.

You can read the entire interview here.

Miscellany

Here is an interview with Heather Watson, who won her first main draw match this week.

Sabine Lisicki says that she will return to the tour in Portoroz in July.

Bethanie Mattek-Sands is helping the Nashville flood relief effort.

Martina Hingis says she is undecided about returning to the tour as a doubles player.

Paul Vergara analyzes the on-going debate about Caroline Wozniacki.

Here are the Nike dresses that Maria Sharapova, Serena Williams and Li Na will wear at Wimbledon.

Miscellany

Billie Jean King says that Martina Hingis may return to the tour as a doubles player next year. Hingis is playing a full World Team Tennis season this summer.

Virginie Razzano has withdrawn from Wimbledon, citing an injured left foot, as well as a right thigh tear brought about by the foot injury. Razzano says that all the trouble started with a massage given to her by a tour trainer. The massage, which she said was painful, led to edema, and then matters became worse. Razzano has begun proceedings against the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour, and is reportedly seeking damages.

Not to be missed: WTA Backspin's 2010 Clay Court Awards. 

Dinara Safina has lost her fifth match in row, going out in the first round in s'Hertogenbosch to Magdalena Rybarikova. Rybarikova won the match 6-7, 6-4, 6-4  on her sixth match point. Safina was seeded 2nd.

Eastbourne defending champion Caroline Wozniacki plays Aravane Rezai in the first round of the tournament this week.

Hingis hasn't ruled out a return to tour in doubles competition

Martina Hingis says that, health permitting, she could come back to the tour in doubles only, perhaps to play with Lindsay Davenport as her partner. Hingis is making a return to World Team Tennis this summer, when she will play for the New York Buzz. Also, she and and longtime doubles partner and friend Anna Kournikova will play in the Ladies Invitational doubles competition at Wimbledon this year.

Miscellany

Wild cards into the main draw of Indian Wells have gone to the following players: Justine Henin, Alicia Molik, Eleni Daniilidou, Tamira Paszek, Alja Tomljanovic, Christina McHale, Alexa Glatch, and Bethanie Mattek-Sands.

Martina Hingis is getting married to Andreas Bieri, an attorney from Zurich. Hingis used to be engaged to ATP player Radek Stepanek, who is also getting married--to tour player Nicole Vaidisova.

The Orange Bowl may leave Key Biscayne and return to Miami Beach.

Tennis Australia is involved in some controversy at the moment.

Justine Henin, Lindsay Davenport, Martina Navratilova, and Steffi Graf will all be involved in the Indian Wells "Hit for Haiti" exhibition. (via On the Baseline)

Hingis to play a complete WTT season

On February 11, when the World Team Tennis marquee player draft is held, one team will select Martina Hingis as a member. Hingis has signed on to play all fourteen matches this season.

The other marquee players--Venus Williams, Serena Williams and Maria Sharapova--will each play five matches.

Quote of the day

"If it [WTA tennis] was played in the backyard, then I'd probably think about it twice."

Martina Hingis, on why she doesn't want to return to the tour

Miscellany

Justine Henin has won another exhibition match, this time in Cairo. She defeated Nadia Petrova 7-6, 6-2.

Melanie Oudin defeated Serena Williams 7-5 in an exhibition match in Athens, Georgia.

Naomi Broady has now won three ITF tournaments in three weeks.

Unseeded Canadian Gabriela Dabrowski upset top seed Kristina Mladenovic in the final of the 18s singles final of the 2009 Orange Bowl.

Virginia Ruano Pascual will play doubles with Sania Mirza at the Australian Open.

On the Baseline has an exclusive interview with Martina Hingis.

Tennis Channel reaches new depths of sexism

Tennis Channel has a series called "Best of Five." This series includes the five biggest upsets, five worst calls, five best one-slam wonders, etc. This morning, for the first (and only) time, I saw "Five Best Breakups." Rated at number 3 was "black widow" Martina Hingis, whose ATP romantic partners' careers tended to dive after they became involved with her. Of course, with the exception of Radek Stepanek, she was not involved with players who had especially high rankings, anyway.

I don't have any problem with the whole "black widow" thing. It's mildly amusing (though I can think of tennis breakups more deserving of being in the top five--the other breakups all involved parnters, coaches, etc.). But Tennis Channel, just like Tennis magazine, made the segment all about how Hingis "went through men" on the tour. Not only did she "go through" a "lot" of men--she was a "good date" because she "took care" of them.

In short, the segment is a disgusting piece of sexism. So Hingis dated men on the tour. So she had sex with them--oh, no!--that makes her a slut, doesn't it? Because that's close to what Tennis Channel (and Tennis) said. But she gets a bit of a pass because she "took care" of them.

Sexism aside for a moment, it's only logical that tennis players are likely to date one another; it's not like they have time to hang out in their hometowns and meet romantic partners socially. There are several men on the ATP Tour who date women on the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour, and there are a few who dated several WTA players, but the sports media does not crudely imply that they are trashy and indecent, or announce that they "go through a lot of women."

The fact that--with regard to the sexual double standard (and all gender double standards)--nothing has changed since the 1950s is maddening. Tennis Channel should be ashamed, but hey--we're talking about the organization that kept Justin Gimelstob on its payroll.

Happy Birthday, Happy Freedom

Today is Martina Hingis's 29th birthday. Perhaps more important, today marks the end of her two-year ban from professional tennis. Though Hingis has no intention of playing on the tour, the ban also prevented her from attending tournaments, doing commentary, and even being recognized as a past champion.

The bittersweet career of Martina Hingis--marked by both tennis genius and significant under-achievement--was hampered by both Hingis's immaturity and by chronic injury. Then, to literally add insult to injury, there was the ban. Anyone who reads this blog knows where I stand regarding the ban and the doping law enforcement establishment, so I won't go into that.

I'll just say Happy Birthday, Martina.

Miscellany

Sania Mirza continues to have problems with her wrist. She has recently received more treatment, and says that--while she is not without pain--she feels ready for the U.S. Open. This wrist problem has lasted a very long time.

Here is an interview with Vera Zvonareva.

And an interview with Melanie Oudin.

Martina Hingis will be a contestant on the new season of Strictly Come Dancing.

Vera Zvonareva recently walked the runway for K-Swiss in New York City.

Officials of the U.S. Open are warning players not to use Twitter in such a way that they might violate anti-corruption rules. No word on violating anti-narcissism rules.

I kissed a girl...and I liked it

Cocaine is not a performance-enhancing drug. I have covered that subject many times. But, given that An Important Body says it is, players are in trouble if caught using it.

I have no problem whatsoever with Richard Gasquet's having his ban rescinded. However, I worked in the chemical dependency field for several years, and "I kissed a woman who had used cocaine and I didn't know it" is the most oft-cited "reason" for having a positive test result that I heard. I heard it over and over, and I heard several variations of it.

So Gasquet, who had a significant positive result, is free to play tennis, and Martina Hingis--who had a much less significant positive result--has a two-year ban.

Go figure. It's as if the people making the rules were...on drugs.

Miscellany

Sania Mirza plans to marry Indian businessman Sohrab Mirza, who is described as a long-time friend. Mirza's engagement is set to take place on July 10.

Justine Henin has been hanging out at the French Open.

Martina Hingis says she is looking forward to October, when her two-year suspension will be over. "I'll be free to move, return to riding or tennis tournaments like Roland Garros and Wimbledon. My dignity will be restored."

Damir Dokic is currently on trial for allegedly threatening to kill the Australian ambassador and for possessing illegal weapons. He could get up to eight years in prison.

Lindsay Lee-Waters (remember Lindsay Lee-Waters?), the top seed at the Carson City 50k challenger, has been defeated in the first round by Nicole Gibbs.

Watching the classics

After seeing the 1986 French Open final again this week on Tennis Channel, I believe that--first set excluded--it was even better than the 1985 final. I say excluding the first set because Chris Evert, who rarely double-faulted her entire career, somehow double-faulted the entire first set away. But after that, the shot-making by both her and Martina Navratilova was spectacular. These are two of my favorite matches of all time, partly because they were comeback matches for Evert, but also because they show the two champions in such wonderful form.

Tennis Channel also showed the infamous 1999 final, which I just about cannot bear to watch. Though I am well aware that Martina Hingis brought much of her pain on herself in that match, I still think the French crowd was too harsh on her. And--as great as it was to see the almost-30-year-old Steffi Graf win her 22nd major--it still pains me to watch Hingis let it slip away the way she did.

More painful, though, is to listen to Graf tell her opponent, "don't worry," because she would have other chances and she was sure to win her own French Open title. Shortly before Graf comforted Hingis, Chris Evert proclaimed, from the broadcast booth, that "She's going to be around for a long time, and she's sure to win the French Open." Of course, she not only failed to win the French Open--she never won another major. It still makes me sad.

Another thing that makes me sad is that Evert is no longer a French Open commentator. Several years ago, she asked to be relieved of her duties because she wanted to spend more time with her adolescent sons. I assumed that, once they got a bit older, she would come back, but she never did. The French Open just isn't the same without Evert.

Sharapova withdraws from Hong Kong exhibition

Maria Sharapova, stating that she is not ready to play competitive tennis following a long shoulder injury rehab, has withdrawn from the January 7 exhibition tournament in Hong Kong. The replacement player will be Anna Chakvetadze, and there is also talk that Martina Hingis may play doubles at the event.