Martina Hingis has advanced to the semi-finals of the Mondial Australian Women's Hardcourts tournament on the Gold Coast with a win which may silence some of her detractors.
Hingis, playing her first quarter-final match on the WTA Tour since the 2002 Pilot Pen International in New Haven, Connecticut, saw off Spain's Nuria Llagostera Vives 6-2 4-6 6-0.
Doubts had been raised about former world number one Hingis's fitness going into the event - the 25-year-old left the tour after the 2002 season due to nagging injuries to her left foot, ankle and heel - but she proved herself against the Spaniard with a deciding set whitewash.
"I know I can last three sets now, especially mentally," Hingis said. "That was the biggest weapon I had today.
"I would've been pretty hard on myself if I had lost this match because I had it totally under control."
Several top players have questioned whether or not the five-time grand slam champion can make it back into the upper echelons of the sport.
And Llagostera Vives, ranked 50 in the world, also had her doubts. She said: "She's done everything in tennis so I don't see why she can't do it again but it's too early to say because you never know what can happen.
"This is her first tournament (of her comeback) and she could get injured or there could be other problems."
Next up for Hingis, who won the Australian Open, Wimbledon and the US Open as a 16-year-old in 1997, is a showdown with fourth seed Flavia Pennetta of Italy, who posted a 6-2 5-7 6-3 triumph over fifth-seeded Tatiana Golovin of France.
Fellow Swiss and top seed Patty Schnyder won't be an obstacle to Hingis as she went down 6-4 6-3 to Lucie Safarova of the Czech Republic.
Third seed Dinara Safina of Russia, who lost just one game in her previous three sets, easily moved into the semis with a 6-1 6-3 victory over eighth-seeded Anabel Medina Garrigues of Spain.