Hingis, Kournikova in final

Russian pin-up girl Anna Kournikova, third seed, wriggled her way through to a 7-6 (7-4), 6-2 win and avenged her loss to Anne-Gaelle Sidot of France at Wimbledon last season.

Kournikova lost her serve to go down 4-5 and 5-6 in the first set, but each time she broke back to force a tie-breaker in which she chalked up a comfortable 4-1 lead before getting into her rhythm.

Eighth seed Magdalena Maleeva of Bulgaria earned a semi-final place against Hingis when she outclassed the last local hope, Shinobu Asagoe, 6-1, 7-6 (7-1) in 85 minutes.

Sugiyama, whose only win over Hingis came at the Atlanta Olympics, got off to a sluggish start with a double fault on a break point, symbolizing the remainder of the first set.

But Sugiyama never hesitated to attack, forcing Hingis to make some errors, and came back from one service break down three times in the second set. She broke again in the 12th game to even the match.

However, Hingis soon steadied herself and, although she lost the second game, never let the momentum get away to finish off the match in 96 minutes.

Hingis stretched her win-loss record against Sugiyama to 5-1.

‘Rafter sweats twice than average person’
Perth: PATRICK Rafter’s problems with cramping are associated with abnormally high sweat levels and not a lack of fitness, medical tests have found.The two-time US Open champion loses up to three litres of fluids per hour during tennis matches, twice the average level, which robs the muscles of electrolytes and causes them to cramp.

He will also be able to keep his trademark beard and long hair after medical experts could find no evidence they contributed to his profuse sweating.Rafter was tested yesterday by Dr Mark Febbriao of the University of Melbourne’s physiology department and Dr Jim Cotter from the Defence, Science and Technology Organisation.

Rafter was weakened by severe leg cramps in the Australian Open semi-final against Andre Agassi and laboured to defeat in five sets after leading two sets to one.

He also cramped up playing for Australia in last December’s Davis Cup final against Spain in Barcelona and had to retire from his singles match against Juan Carlos Ferrero.