If Martina Hingis had thought that she might settle back behind the microphone at the end of her playing career, such fancies were demolished yesterday when confirmation came that cocaine had been found in her bloodstream during last year’s Wimbledon championships.
A two-year ban has been handed out to the 27-year-old Swiss, who became the world No 1 at 17 and won five grand-slam titles but whose reputation went up in smoke when she took the dramatic decision to “out” herself in November, revealing that an “A” sample had tested positive for the narcotic, a banned substance.
Hingis, who has also been ordered to repay $129,481 (about £65,000) in prize money, denied the charge, calling it “horrendous and monstrous”. She added that she had never taken drugs and felt “100 per cent innocent”. She said: “The reason I have come out with this is because I do not want to have a fight with anti-doping authorities.”
However, the International Tennis Federation said yesterday: “Following a two-day hearing in December 2007, an independent antidoping tribunal found that a sample provided by Ms Hingis at the Wimbledon championships had tested positive for a metabolite of cocaine. The tribunal rejected the suggestion made on behalf of Ms Hingis that there were doubts about the identity and/or integrity of the sample. The tribunal also rejected her plea of no (or no significant) fault or negligence, on the basis that no mitigation was possible as it had not been shown how the cocaine entered her system.”