Martina Hingis emerged victorious today from a battle of former world No.1s, beating Monica Seles to win the Pan Pacific Open tennis tournament for the fourth time.
The Swiss top seed, playing her third event of the season after a three-month lay-off due to ankle surgery, tamed an array of hard-hit strokes from the American third seed for a 7-6 (8/6), 4-6, 6-3 win.
"I worked very hard after I had the surgery, so it's nice to finish off the week with the victory here," said Hingis, 21, repeating her semi-final win over Seles at the Australian Open.
"Hopefully, in the next tournament in the United States, I'll continue the winning streak. But it's definitely great for me to finish off like this."
Hingis had to save a double break point at 15-40 in the second game, while Seles saved one at 30-40 in the third, but neither took a lead with break opportunities rare before the first set tie-breaker.
After losing her serve twice to go down 1-5 in the tie-breaker, Hingis pulled off timely breaks to claw back to 4-5.
Seles scored another break to have a double set point at 6-4, only to misfire her powerful double-fisted strokes four times in a row to surrender the set.
But Seles never hesitated to attack.
She fired several sizzling service return winners to break Hingis for the first time in the seventh game of the second set, and, although she lost the following game, broke again in the ninth before levelling the match.
Seles, however, hit a double fault to give a 0-40 break chance to Hingis in the second game of the decider, and never recovered after losing the game two points later.
"There's not much that you can do at being down 5-1 (in a tie-breaker), so you just try to hang in there. I was trying to step it up and stay in control on the points," said Hingis.
"But it was difficult, it was pretty much like a lot everything here on this surface. It was a great match. Sometimes, of course, I could have served better, but it was definitely important to win the first set."
For Hingis, it was her sixth straight appearance in the final here with victories in 1997, 1999 and 2000. It was also her second title of the season, following her victory at the Sydney International, and her 40th overall.
With the win, which brought her the winner's check of 182,000 dollars, the Swiss Miss stretched her record against Seles to 14 wins against four defeats in major tournaments.
Seles, 28, who has never won a Grand Slam on grass at Wimbledon, failed to bury her jinx on the fast indoor surface here following her quarter-final loss in 1996 and semi-final loss in 1999.
She had to be satisfied with the 97,000-dollar runner-up prize.
AFP