Slam feather at last in Jennifer Capriati

Capriati jumped for joy after hitting a backhand winner on her first match point and then burst into tears before running to her father and coach Stefano in the stands beside centre court at Melbourne Park.

‘‘I can’t believe this is all happening. Who would have thought I would ever have made it here after so much has happened,’’ Capriati said.

Capriati, the 1992 Olympic gold medallist, was playing in her first Grand Slam final and won A$830,500 ($448,470) the biggest pay cheque of her disjointed career.

Capriati’s first win over the Swiss world No. 1 in six matches was remarkable for the ease with which she disposed of an out-of-sorts Hingis in just 63 minutes. Hingis was unable to threaten Capriati’s powerful serve and deep groundstrokes in her fifth consecutive appearance in the finals of the season-opening grand slam event.

But Hingis achieved an important personal milestone, beating the two powerful Williams sisters on her way to the final, the first time she has achieved the Williams double in the same tournament after three previous failures.

She survived a three-set epic against Serena in the quarter-finals and then crushed Venus in the semis. However Hingis said the final proved one match too far. The match marked only Hingis’ fourth defeat in 42 matches in Melbourne stretching back to 1995.

The Swiss won the Australian title from 1997-99 before losing to Lindsay Davenport in last year’s final. Hingis had been in rich form before the final, helping Switzerland to win the Hopman Cup and then taking the Sydney International title before coming to Melbourne as she stretched her record to 33-1 since the US Open.

But against 12th seed Capriati that record came crashing down. The American raced to a 4-0 lead in the first set when she broke a tentative Hingis’ first two service games.

She sealed the first set in only 31 minutes, her heavy and accurate groundstrokes keeping the world number one running to all corners of the court.Capriati served for the set in the eighth game only to drop her serve for the first and only time.

She also held two set points on Hingis’ serve in the ninth game but was unable to convert them. Capriati then held her nerve to serve out the set in the 10th game on her third set point.

Hingis, by contrast, started slowly and littered her play with unforced errors. The fifth game of the second set signalled the end for Hingis as Capriati raced to three break points at 0-40. On the second point of the game, a Capriati backhand which was called out by the linesman was overruled and called in by Australian chair umpire John Blom.

The ruling clearly unsettled Hingis, who complained and then served a double-fault to hand Capriati the vital break two points later. Hingis slumped in her chair after the game and continued to grumble about the call before covering her face with her hand.

Doubles final: In the men’s doubles final, Australian doubles specialist fourth seeds Todd Woodbridge of Australia and Jonas Bjorkman beat the German-Zimbabwean pair of David Prinosil and Byron Black 6-1, 5-7, 6-4, 6-4.