Sania Mirza

New Delhi: The long lull in her activity at the WTA Tour eventually reflected on Sania Mirza’s rankings as she slipped three ladders down to 38th in the list announced Monday.

The Indian, who was out of action since playing in the Fed Cup in Seoul, will be back on the circuit this week to shape up for the French Open beginning on May 29.

Sania will begin as fifth seed in the $200,000 Tier III Tour event in Istanbul.

The Hyderabadi will play local hope Ipek Senoglu, a wild card entrant in the first round.

Among the other Indian girls within top 500, Shikha Uberoi, an Indian of American origin, maintained her 179th position while Delhi’s Bhambri sisters ? Ankita and Sanaa ? had steep fall sliding to 343rd and 475th, respectively, from their previous 332 and 451 ranks.

Isha lakhani moved two places up to 365 and Rushmi Chakravarthi advanced six places to 440.

Among the men, Leander Paes moved one place up to 13th while Mahesh Bhupathi went down from 28th to 29th in the doubles rankings.

Meanwhile, Martina Hingis vaulted back into the world’s top 20 for the first time since quitting the sport in 2002.

The Swiss former world No.1 re-entered the upper echelon of women’s tennis at No. 14 following victory in the Italian Open on Sunday.

TENNIS RANKINGS

ATP ? 1 (1) Roger Federer (Swi, 7010); 2 (2) Rafael Nadal (Esp, 4545); 3 (3) David Nalbandian (Arg, 3065); 4 (5) Ivan Ljubicic (Cro, 2610) 5 (4) Andy Roddick (US, 2585) 6 (6) Nikolay Davydenko (Rus, 2295); 7 (12) Tommy Robredo (Esp, 2020); 8 (7) James Blake (US, 1925); 9 (8) Fernando Gonzalez (Chi, 1780); 10 (9) Gaston Gaudio (Arg, 1745).

WTA ? 1 (1) Amelie Mauresmo (Fra, 3272); 2 (2) Kim Clijsters (Bel, 3048); 3 (3) Nadia Petrova (Rus, 2620); 4 (4) Maria Sharapova (Rus, 2543); 5 (5) Justine Henin-Hardenne (Bel, 2408); 6 (6) Mary Pierce (Fra, 2302); 7 (7) Lindsay Davenport (US, 2254); 8 (8) Elena Dementieva (Rus, 1990); 9 (9) Patty Schnyder (Swi, 1753); 10 (10) Svetlana Kuznetsova (Rus, 1711).