Monday, June 05, 2006

In Praise of the Swiss Miss

Seth Stevenson comes to love Martina Hingis:
I've also come—to my own great shock—to adore her style of play. It turns out I got bored with all those power hitters on the women's tour. What fun is there in watching cannon forehands, flat and low and hard, one after another? Half the players seem to come from a mysterious genetics lab somewhere in Russia, which pumps out 9-foot-tall blondes who do nothing but grunt, crush the ball cleanly down the line, and occasionally attempt an ill-advised drop shot. Meanwhile, Hingis' arsenal includes some gorgeous, looping topspins; bedeviling slices; pinpoint placement; and sudden changes of pace. As with her countryman Roger Federer (though she lacks his floating, ghostlike movement around the court), it's Hingis' tremendous variety that makes her such a treat to watch.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

"Half the players seem to come from a mysterious genetics lab somewhere in Russia, which pumps out 9-foot-tall blondes who do nothing but grunt, crush the ball cleanly down the line, and occasionally attempt an ill-advised drop shot."

No fair. This guy is copying my "wanted" ad from Match.com.