Martina Hingis, 29 years old, is not coming back to tennis.

When Kim Clijsters won the U.S. Open last month, the state of the WTA tour was dragged into even more scrutiny. Then no. 1 player, Dinara Safina, hasn’t won any Grand Slam title; Serena Williams, now back at no. 1,  is facing a possible suspension because of her cussing brouhaha; former no. 1s Maria Sharapova and Ana Ivanovic can’t go deep in any tournament (until Maria won Tokyo a few weeks later); and Venus Williams doesn’t look like she wants to win unless its Wimbledon. Then, all of a sudden, fresh-from-retirement, new mom Clijsters stole the limelight from them all.

Which then brings to us to Justine Henin, the only tennis player ever to retire while ranked as world no. 1. Henin announced her return to tennis shortly after the U.S. Open, and this is a news that was welcomed by the tennis community with much enthusiasm. This is one player who is poised to be threat to everyone, again.

So when Martina Hingis’ two-year suspension from the sport (due to a cocaine-positive test, which she is still vehemently denying) reaching its end, everyone wants to know if she’s giving tennis another try (she first retired in 2001 due to injury and made a comeback in 2006). Well, she isn’t. Reportedly, she feels that her career is on a downward spiral anyway. She prefers her new life now, donning equestrian apparel and riding her four horses. She (reportedly) recently starred in Britain’s version of Dancing with the Stars.

My thoughts, I guess. I’m a bit fickle minded these days, too. Last week, while watching Wimbledon, I decided that I am a Maria Sharapova fan because although she lost that round 2 match against Gisela Dulko, she demonstrated the ferocity and fighting spirit that she is well known for. Come the quarters, I saw Sabine Lisicki, a teenager from Germany that they are now calling “the new Steffi Graf”, and I thought that this one’s very good, too, and is definitely to watch out for. Then it was the semis and Elena Dementieva almost beat Serena Williams on their semifinal match and I was also very much impressed. Well, I think I’ll pick Dementieva to cheer for by August during the U.S. Open. During the men’s semis, on the other hand, I was alternately astounded by some Andy Roddick  shots and then some absolutely brilliant winners from Andy Murray, that even though I was never much a fan of either of them, I watched their match in full and at the edge of my seat, so to speak. Despite my frequent change  of hearts on who to root for this past Wimbledon fortnight, one thing remains – I am giddily anticipating Roger Federer’s win tomorrow. Time to break the records. To me, that’s almost a done deal. I’ll drink some from the shower faucet if I’m proven wrong (*fingers crossed*).

This Monday, all roads will lead to SW19, that southwest London address that houses the hallowed turf of the All-England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club, for a tournament known worldwide as The Wimbledon Championships – the most important and prestigious tennis major. If you are new to this site, then I’m making my advanced proclamation that Roger Federer will get back his title, his 6th. Color me sad in three weeks if he doesn’t.

Star Sports Asia has been showing the Official Wimbledon films of the past couple of decades and I was fortunate enough to have seen most of them. I still get chills – good chills - whenever I see that Steffi Graf win over Jana Novotna in 1993 (final) or Roger Federer’s historic win over Pete Sampras in 2001 (4th round).  Watching those clips makes me realize how much I have grown to love tennis as a sport, even just as a remote spectator. Andre Agassi once said that tennis has taught him how to deal with life. I, for one, believe that statement. If only I can play the sport regularly, that would be better than taking the best diet pills out there, for sure.

If New York Yankees tickets are what American sports enthusiasts go crazy about, there’s one event on the European side that I am very much looking forward to. Of course, I won’t get to be there in person but just the thought that Wimbledon greats Andre Agassi and Steffi Graf are going to play at Centre Court on SW19 after all these years is a dream come true for any tennis fan. For any tennis fan who don’t hate these two. But why would anyone hate either of them? Geez. So I’m a total fangirl when it comes to the Agassis (Andre by association; Steffi is my tennis hero along with Federer).

The husband-and-wife team will play a doubles match, in front of 15,000 audience members, on May 17, five weeks before the Wimbledon tournament. The event is dubbed as “A Centre Court Celebration” and the opposing team will be composed of Kim Clijsters and Tim Henman. This exhibition will serve as the try out to check the Centre Court playing conditions under the newly constructed roof. 

From AP:  The program will feature a men’s singles, a women’s singles and a mixed doubles match. The matches will be played in a pro-set format — the first to eight games, with a tiebreaker at 8-8.

I didn’t know that sports betting is so prevalent until I’ve heard about the case of the Russian tennis player Nikolay Davydenko – he became, what they say, tennis’ fall guy when organizers became ”curious” about matches that appeared to have betting patterns. In other words, it seemed suspicious that someone of Davydenko’s caliber (he’s a consistent top 10 player) can lose to someone unranked so early in a tournament and then win the next tournament he enters. Could it be that he’s rigging his own results? He has since been cleared from all charges.

Sports handicapping is the process of predicting the result of a competition, and in the world of sports, tennis is possibly among the least profitable in terms of winnings. But it is a reality; I remember the 2004 movie Wimbledon where James McAvoy (the brother of Paul Bettany’s character) always bets against his brother during tournaments. Well, things like that happen in real life and it may be a source of entertainment for spectators but the athletes should not be a part of it. Imagine if Federer purposely lost that epic Wimbledon final because his girlfriend took a big bet in favor of Nadal? You get the picture.

He may be dropping to no. 2 in the world ranking in a weeks’ time; he may be losing confidence and tournaments lately, but you can’t say Roger Federer doesn’t have style!

Here’s TheFed carrying the Swiss flag at the opening ceremony of the 2008 Bejing Olympics. I got the photo from tennisforum.com and the highlighted part is obviously a mistake.

He looks good in red, no? I can imagine him driving a red Ferrari F430. I bet this guy doesn’t need car insurance, no matter how many millions his car(s) costs. With his tour schedule, I wonder if he even drives at all. Tennis stars have such a globe-trotting lifestyle.

I was watching an old tennis match last night and got fascinated once again by the colorful language of the commentators. Most of those “behind-the-curtain” voices are former pros and champions so their love for the game and their first-hand experiences make for an interesting analysis of what is going on inside that small rectangular space. My fascination with tennis possibly goes beyond its being a competition but more on its being an art. To borrow the lines of someone else who wrote about this very same idea,

the beauty of the game is seeing, then trying to remember, the way a ball travels around the court during a point…Strategy entails mapping out and resolving combinations of lines — patterns — just as an artist maps a drawing. The fan’s pleasure comes in redrawing the lines as a memory.

Within sameness there can be endless variety. Artists have proved this over centuries. It’s the art of tennis, too — or part of the art, because there is beauty to the sound of the game and to its passage through time. Call it the music of the sport. Which is to say nothing of its drama, offcourt and on, or of the ballet of Federer’s footwork …

-Michael Kimmelman, NYT 9/06

In tennis, you follow these simple rules – keep your eye on the ball; keep the ball on or inside the lines. This reminds me of an entry on mordsith‘s blog about following rules and brought me to the realization that I’m not really someone who colors outside the lines; mostly, I’d rather paint the lines.