Post by Admin on Jan 26, 2015 23:52:08 GMT
True enough, blond bombshell Anna Kournikova never won a WTA singles title, even though she had the talent to be a top player. (She reached the Wimbledon semifinals in 1997 at just 16.) But while she was known the world over for her looks rather than her forehand, her limited success had a lot to do simply with bad luck -- serious back and foot injuries hampered her career, ending it outright not long after she reached legal drinking age. Plus, the tour's smaller, out-of-the-way tournaments, where she could have racked up trophies playing middle-of-the-road competition, never really motivated her. She was only interested in the game's biggest stages (and its lucrative exhibitions).
The loser tag also isn't fair because Kournikova is a Grand Slam champion. Along with being tennis' chief sex symbol throughout her short time on tour, she was also one of its best doubles players, winning Australian Open titles in 1999 and 2002, both with Martina Hingis. Hingis is the reason Kournikova's name is in the air again in Melbourne: the 34-year-old "Swiss Miss" is back on the scene. Hingis returned from her second retirement last year, this time playing only doubles. She certainly likes partners with flair: she's playing with Italy's volatile veteran Flavia Pennetta. The team, which reached the U.S. Open final in September, lost an entertaining third-round match Monday at the Australian Open.
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Hingis and Kournikova were the tennis version of Burton and Taylor. They raged at and threatened one another on court, slagged each other off to the press -- and always found themselves drawn back together. "Do you think you are the queen?" Hingis famously yelled during an exhibition match in Chile, after her frenemy had gone into preening mode. "Because I am the real queen!" Kournikova burst into tears.
Kournikova was, however, unquestionably the queen. Hingis won Wimbledon and the U.S. Open, but her doubles partner out-earned her in endorsements by many millions. Kournikova posed in a bikini for a provocative best-selling calendar and became the face -- and bust -- of a sports bra brand. Her fame (and the brazen way she embraced it) engendered a lot of resentment among her fellow players, as well as criticism from the sports press. The goodhearted Lindsay Davenport, the 1999 Wimbledon champion, was one of the few players who felt sorry for the Russian's plight. "She didn't ask to be this pretty," Davenport once said.
Casual fans assumed that the more successful Hingis carried the pretty-girl Kournikova to their doubles triumphs, but in fact they complemented one another perfectly. Hingis had the soft hands and clever variety, Kournikova the galloping athleticism and go-for-it mindset. On court, they fit together as if from a mold. They called themselves "the Spice Girls of tennis." Along with those two Australian championships, they also reached the 1999 French Open final together -- losing to the Williams sisters -- and won back-to-back WTA Tour Finals. Overall, Kournikova scored 16 WTA doubles titles in her career, variously partnering Natasha Zvereva, Barbara Schett and Iroda Tulyaganova when she and Hingis were on the outs.