The

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

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 ...

defeated

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

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 ...

in the final, 7–6^(10–8), 6–2 to win the gold medal in Women's Singles

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 ...

at the

1996 Summer Olympics The 1996 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXVI Olympiad, also known as Atlanta 1996 and commonly referred to as the Centennial Olympic Games) were an international multi-sport event held from July 19 to August 4, 1996, in Atlanta, ...

. In the bronze-medal match, the

Czech Republic The Czech Republic, also known as Czechia, and historically known as Bohemia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the south ...

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. ...

defeated the United States'

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 ...

, 7–6^(10–8), 6–4. Sánchez Vicario became the second woman to win multiple Olympic tennis medals in singles (following

Steffi Graf Stefanie Maria Graf ( , ; born 14 June 1969) is a German former professional tennis player. She was ranked as the List of WTA number 1 ranked singles tennis players, world No. 1 in women's singles by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for a r ...

in 1988 and

1992 1992 was designated as International Space Year by the United Nations. Events January * January 1 – Boutros Boutros-Ghali of Egypt replaces Javier Pérez de Cuéllar of Peru as United Nations Secretary-General. * January 6 ** The Republ ...

); Fernández would have done so as well, but the rules had been changed since the last Games to add a bronze medal playoff match. The tournament was held from 23 July to 2 August at the Stone Mountain Tennis Center, in

Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Georgia (U.S. state), most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. It is the county seat, seat of Fulton County, Georg ...

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the South Caucasus * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the southeastern United States Georgia may also refer to: People and fictional characters * Georgia (name), a list of pe ...

of the

United States of America The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 contiguo ...

. There were 64 competitors from 34 nations, with each nation having up to three players.

Jennifer Capriati Jennifer Maria Capriati (born March 29, 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 17 weeks. Capriati won 14 WTA Tour-level singles t ...

was the defending champion from 1992, but she chose not to participate.

Background

This was the eighth appearance of the women's singles tennis. A women's event was held only once during the first three Games (only men's tennis was played in 1896 and 1904), but has been held at every Olympics for which there was a tennis tournament since 1908. Tennis was not a medal sport from 1928 to 1984, though there were demonstration events in 1968 and 1984. Returning from the 1992 Games were both bronze medalists,

of Spain and

of the United States, as well as all four of the quarterfinal losers. Silver medalist (and 1988 champion)

was kept out by a knee injury. The U.S. team was strong even without defending champion

, with #1 seed

Monica Seles Monica Seles (born December 2, 1973) is a Serbian–American former professional tennis player. She was ranked as the List of WTA number 1 ranked singles tennis players, world No. 1 in women's singles by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for ...

, Fernandez, and

. Spain also sent a strong team, with Sánchez Vicario joined by

Conchita Martínez Conchita Martínez Bernat (born 16 April 1972) is a Spanish former professional tennis player and current coach. She was the first Spaniard to win the women's singles title at Wimbledon, doing so in 1994. Martínez also was the runner-up at th ...

as the next two seeds behind Seles. Belarus, Chinese Taipei, Croatia, the Czech Republic, the Dominican Republic, Luxembourg, Russia, Slovakia, and Tunisia each made their debut in the event. France and Great Britain each made their seventh appearance, tied for most among nations to that point.

Competition format

The competition was a single-elimination tournament, but with a significant change from 1988 and 1992. A bronze-medal match was held, unlike the previous two Games. Matches were best-of-three sets. The 12-point tie-breaker continued be used in any set, except the third, that reached 6–6.

Schedule

All times are

Eastern Daylight Time The Eastern Time Zone (ET) is a time zone encompassing part or all of 23 states in the eastern part of the United States, parts of eastern Canada, and the state of Quintana Roo in Mexico. * Eastern Standard Time (EST) is five hours behin ...

( UTC-4)

Seeds

Draw

Finals

Top half

Section 1

Section 2

Bottom half

Section 3

Section 4

References

ITF Olympic site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Tennis at the 1996 Summer Olympics - Women's singles Women's Singles 1996 in women's tennis Women's events at the 1996 Summer Olympics