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| October 14, 2001 | Sunday | Rajab 26, 1422 |
Injured Hingis to lose top spot to Capriati
FILDERSTADT (Germany) Oct 13: Martina Hingis has provisionally lost her world number one ranking after she had to retire injured from her semifinal against Lindsay Davenport at the Filderstadt Grand Prix on Saturday.
A WTA spokeswoman said that Swiss Hingis, who trailed American Davenport 2-1 when she pulled out with a sprained ankle, will be overtaken by American Jennifer Capriati when the new rankings are released on Monday.
Capriati is set to become world number one for the first time despite her quarter-final defeat to France’s Sandrine Testud in the German tournament on Friday.
Hingis, who first captured the number one spot in March 1997, had topped the rankings without interruption since May last year.
But the 21-year-old has not won a Grand Slam event since the 1999 Australian Open and has not claimed a tournament of any kind since February.
Capriati, now 25, burst into the limelight as a teenager but her career then took a nosedive after she ran into trouble with the police and was charged with shoplifting and possessing drugs.
Saturday’s results (x denotes seeding):
Semifinals: Lindsay Davenport (USA x3) bt Martina Hingis (Swi x1) 2-1, rtd; Justine Henin (Bel x6) bt Sandrine Testud (Fra) 6-3, 7-6 (7/3)
SHANGHAI: Top seed Monica Seles extended her unbeaten streak to 12 matches after routing Alicia Molik of Australia 6-1 6-0 in the semifinals of the Shanghai Open on Saturday.
In the other semifinal, unseeded Nicole Pratt of Australia upset seventh-seeded Rita Grande of Italy 6-3 6-4 to reach the first WTA final of her career.
Molik never won another game against Seles after holding serve at 0-1 in the first set. The Australian, ranked 59th in the world, won just nine points on the American’s serve, including two in the first set.
She also had trouble with her own serve, double faulting twice in the fourth game of the first set to give Seles her first break, then twice more in the opening game of the second set to drop serve again.
Seles has not lost a match since going down to Czech Daja Bedanova in the fourth round of the U.S. Open last month.
Since then, Seles has won two titles, the Brazil Open and the Japan Open in Tokyo last week.
Pratt came back from 2-4 down in the second set to beat Grande. The Australian outslugged Grande from the baseline throughout the match, while the Italian continuously made unforced errors on her backhand slice.
Pratt has reached the third round of five tournaments this year, but never advanced beyond the quarter-finals.
She goes into Sunday’s final with a 0-2 record against Seles, including a first-round loss at the U.S. Open this year.
Saturday’s results (x denotes seed):
Women’s singles
Semifinals: Monica Seles (USA x1) bt Alicia Molik (Aus) 6-1, 6-0; Nicole Pratt (Aus) bt Rita Grande (Ita x7) 6-3, 6-4
VIENNA: Argentina’s Guillermo Canas overpowered Austrian wild card Stefan Koubek 6-2 7-5 on Saturday to reach the final of the CA Trophy indoor tournament.
Unseeded Canas, who beat defending champion Tim Henman in the second round, raced through the first set with breaks in the first and fifth games while Koubek failed to capitalise on several chances to break his opponent’s serve.
The 23-year-old Argentine began the second set like the first by breaking Koubek’s serve and holding his own easily.
The Austrian was seemed powerless to stop Canas wrapping up the match within the hour.
But egged on by an expectant home crowd, Koubek found the aggression and first serve that helped him eliminate fourth seed Roger Federer of Switzerland in the quarterfinals.
He gave Canas a tough battle until the 11th game of the second set, when the Argentine made a clean break.
Canas will meet either sixth seed and last year’s finalist Tommy Haas of Germany or Sweden’s Thomas Enqvist in Sunday’s final.
Friday’s results (x denotes seeding):
Quarterfinal: Guillermo Canas (Arg) bt Michel Kratochvil (Swi) 6-4, 3-6, 6-2; Stefan Koubek (Aut) bt Roger Federer (Swi x4) 7-6 (7/3), 7-5; Tommy Haas (Ger x6) bt Bohdan Ulihrach (Cze) 6-1, 6-4; Thomas Enqvist (Swe) bt Andreas Vinciguerra (Swe) 6-1,6-4
Saturday’s results
Semifinals: Guillermo Canas (Argentina) bt Stefan Koubek (Aut) 6-2, 7-5
LYON (France): Results in the 800,000 dollar Lyon ATP event here on Friday (x denotes seeding):
Quarterfinals: Xavier Malisse (Bel) bt Jonas Bjorkman (Swe) 6-1, 4-1 retired; Younes el Aynaoui (Mar) bt Juan-Carlos Ferrero (Spa x2) 6-4, 6-4.—Reuters/AFP
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