The 1996 Australian Open was a

tennis Tennis is a List of racket sports, racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent (singles (tennis), singles) or between two teams of two players each (doubles (tennis), doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket st ...

tournament played on outdoor hard courts at

Melbourne Park Melbourne Park is a sports venue in the Melbourne Sports and Entertainment Precinct in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Since 1988, Australia's bicentenary, Melbourne Park has been home of the Australian Open Grand Slam tennis tournament play ...

Melbourne Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung language, Boonwurrung/ or ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city of the States and territories of Australia, Australian state of Victori ...

Victoria Victoria most commonly refers to: * Queen Victoria (1819–1901), Queen of the United Kingdom and Empress of India * Victoria (state), a state of Australia * Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, a provincial capital * Victoria, Seychelles, the capi ...

in Australia. It was the 84th edition of the Australian Open and was held from 15 through 28 January 1996.

Jana Novotná Jana Novotná (; 2 October 1968 – 19 November 2017) was a Czech professional tennis player. She was ranked world No. 2 in women's singles by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) in 1997, and as the world No. 1 in women's doubles for 67 weeks. ...

and

Arantxa Sánchez Vicario Aránzazu Isabel María "Arantxa" Sánchez Vicario (; born 18 December 1971) is a Spanish former professional tennis player. She was ranked as the world No. 1 in women's singles by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for 12 weeks, as well as ...

were the defending champions, but Novotná did not compete this year. Sánchez Vicario partnered alongside

Chanda Rubin Chanda Rubin (born February 18, 1976) is an American former top-10 professional tennis player. During her career, she reached the semifinals at the 1996 Australian Open, the quarterfinals of the French Open three times, and had wins over world N ...

and successfully defended her title, defeating

Lindsay Davenport Lindsay Ann Davenport Leach (born June 8, 1976) is an American former professional tennis player. She was ranked as the world No. 1 in women's singles by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for 98 weeks (including as the year-end No. 1 four ...

and

Mary Joe Fernández Mary Joe Fernández Godsick (born María José Fernández; August 19, 1971) is an American former professional tennis player, who reached a career-high ranking of world No. 4 in both singles and doubles. In singles, Fernández was the runner-up ...

7–5, 2–6, 6–4 in the final. It was the first and only Grand Slam doubles title for Rubin, and the sixth and final Grand Slam doubles title (third and final Australian Open doubles title) for Sánchez Vicario, in their respective careers.

Seeds

Draw

Finals

Top half

Section 1

Section 2

Bottom half

Section 3

Section 4

External links

1996 Australian Open – Women's draws and results
at the

International Tennis Federation The International Tennis Federation (ITF) is the governing body of world tennis, wheelchair tennis, and beach tennis. It was founded in 1913 as the International Lawn Tennis Federation by twelve national tennis associations. there are 211 nat ...

Official Results Archive (Australian Open)
{{DEFAULTSORT:1996 Australian Open - Women's Doubles Women's Doubles Australian Open (tennis) by year – Women's doubles 1996 in Australian women's sport