Former world number one Martina Hingis has secured a wildcard to play doubles with Wimbledon 2013 runner-up Sabine Lisicki at the BNP Paribas Open 2014 in Indian Wells this week.
Hingis grabbed tennis headlines last summer after the Hall of Famer decided to return to professional tennis through doubles, nearly five years since she retired for the second. She played in five tournaments with Daniela Hantuchova during the US Open series but the results were lackluster with the pair failing to win back-to-back matches at thos events. Hingis and Hantuchova faced formidable opponents in earlier rounds of the events since Hingis came back without a ranking.
Clearly, Hingis still has a lot of tennis left on her and wants to make her week in Indian Wells fruitful. The Swiss Miss has an impressive doubles resume with 37 WTA doubles titles amassed so far. Part of those haul were 9 Grand Slam doubles titles. She completed a Calendar Year Grand Slam in doubles back in 1998. She also was ranked number one in doubles for 35 weeks.
Hingis won the Indian Wells doubles titles back in 1999 with Anna Kournikova.
Hingis and Lisicki will have a tough opening round campaign as the duo will face 7th-seeds Casey Dellacqua and Ashleigh Barty. The latter pair had an impressive 2013 season which saw them reaching three Grand Slam doubles finals as a team.
