Hingis pulls out of Australian Open

Martina Hingis has ruled herself out of the Australian Open, raising fears that the 22-year-old former world No1 may never play competitively again.

The Swiss player had initially been entered for the first grand slam event of 2003, starting on January 13, but yesterday Octagon, her agents, said she would be withdrawing and had no immediate plans to resume playing.

Hingis has yet to recover from the foot surgery in May that kept her out of the French Open and Wimbledon. She returned to the court in August, in time for the US Open, but in October, after a string of disappointing results, abandoned her comeback. Since then she has been undergoing rehabilitation in Switzerland on what her doctor described as a "career-threatening" injury.

Progress has been slow and it now seems Hingis has no idea when she will be fit enough to play, if ever.

"She came back too early last time and she's still having some trouble with the injury," said an Octagon spokeswoman. "She just wants to make sure that, when she comes back, she can compete at the level she's capable of and that she is really physically and mentally ready. She hasn't put a time on how long that will take but she'll certainly miss the first few months of the year."

The news that Hingis will not play in Melbourne, where she won three of her five grand slam titles and has been in the final for the last six years, will fuel speculation that she is considering retirement.

She is hardly at pensionable age but has been a professional since 14 and has not won a major title since January 1999, when she lifted her last Australian Open trophy. That was before the power players, notably the Williams sisters, took a stranglehold.

At 5ft 7in and slightly built Hingis could not hope to outhit her larger rivals and relied instead on guile and speed. On her return it was clear she was not playing at anything like the standard that, in her pomp, saw her win 45 titles and spend 209 weeks as world No1.

After withdrawing from her home event in Zurich at the beginning of October she admitted: "I don't want to play in front of my fans like this."

Two operations on her left foot, the first in October 2001 after she fell awkwardly in a match, the second in May when torn and loose ligaments were repaired, could have robbed Hingis of mobility.

Hingis and her mother, Melanie Molitor, believe the foot problems are due to wearing the wrong shoes. Hingis alleged as much in what has turned into a £25m lawsuit against the Italian sportswear manufacturers Sergio Tacchini, whose footwear she once endorsed.Whatever the cause, Hingis's losing battle with injury appears to have sapped her self-confidence.