Coco Vandeweghe of the US celebrates winning her Women's singles third round match against Canada's Eugenie Bouchard at the Australian Open on Jan 20, 2017. [Photo/Agencies]

Coco coaxed to answer call of duty

Coco Vandeweghe was in two minds whether to answer the call when an unknown number with a strange international dialling code popped up on her phone last year.

Luckily, she said, she answered it rather than do what she normally does and divert it to voicemail.

Turns out the call was from former world No 1 Martina Hingis. The Swiss wanted to know if she would play doubles with her at the tail end of 2016, including at the US Open.

"I was thinking 'who the heck is calling from this foreign number?', and I usually don't answer my phone," the 25-year-old said courtside after beating Eugenie Bouchard 6-4, 3-6, 7-5 to advance to the fourth round.

"I could have sent Martina straight to my voicemail and that would have been the highlight of my career."

As it transpired Vandeweghe went even further - she turned down Hingis, who has won five Grand Slam singles titles and 12 doubles crowns.

Vandeweghe had committed to playing both the Cincinnati and US Open tournaments with other partners and did not want to let them down.

So the answer was thanks, but no thanks.

Until, that is, the 25-year-old American had a conversation with coach Craig Kardon.

"I told my coach, 'Hey Craig, guess what? Martina just called me'. And he was like, 'which Martina?', because he used to coach Navratilova. And I said, 'no, Hingis, Hingis called me,'" Vandeweghe added.

"I told him that she asked me to play doubles and I told her 'no'. He said, 'What? Are you kidding?'."

Vandeweghe did not require much more convincing and canceled on the other two players she had committed to.

She and Hingis went on to make the final in Cincinnati and the semifinals at Flushing Meadows.