It was her who “proposed” last spring. He hesitated. Finally, he said “yes”, with winter just around the corner. Now, all that remains is the official “wedding” of Swiss tennis at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games. Martina Hingis, 35, and Roger Federer, 34, have already started to make plans to take part in the mixed doubles, depending on their position in the international ranking, to be defined by 6 May 2016.

They make an unlikely couple. Hingis, born in the former Czechoslovakia and a refugee in Switzerland following her mother’s escape from the country, was the enfant terrible of tennis. At 12 years old, she was the youngest tennis player in history to be crowned Grand Slam Junior champion; at 15, paired with Helena Sukova, she won a Grand Slam, and by the age of 22 she was the world no. 1.

Hingis’s heyday was from 1997 to 2001, when she was the highest paid athlete in the world for five successive years. She won a vast number of titles, including five Grand Slams, (one Wimbledon, a US Open and three Australian Opens), and played at the Atlanta 1996 Olympic Games. 

After the dizzy heights of Grand Slam success, Hingis’s career was forced into a pause after suffering serious injuries. She had an impressive comeback in 2015, winning the women’s doubles titles at Wimbledon and the US Open with Indian Sania Mieza.

14 years ago… Roger Federer and Martina Hingis in a doubles tournament in Perth, Australia (Foto: Getty Images/Sean Garnsworthy

As for Roger Federer? For many, there has never been a more technical or elegant tennis player. At Wimbledon alone, he has won seven titles (2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008 and 2012). He has won the Australian Open four times (2004, 2006, 2007 and 2010) and was US Open champion in five consecutive years (2004 to 2008). He also won the French Open in 2009.

At the Olympic Games, Federer won gold in the doubles at Beijing 2008, while at London 2012 he won silver in the singles after losing in the final to Britain's Andy Murray.

Federer, who served in the Swiss Armed Forces, married former tennis star Mirka Varinec in 2009. They are parents to twins Myla Rose and Charlene Riva, born in 2009, and another pair of twins, Leo and Lenhart, born in 2014. He has a foundation for children with special needs.

In 2015, he recorded his 1,000th victory. He was runner-up at Wimbledon to Novak Djokovic and clocked up 11 consecutive victories afterwards (one of which against his Serbian rival, which gave him the Cincinnati title). He was once again a runner-up to Djokovic at the US Open.

Federer took his time in accepting Hingis’ offer due to the marathon of games he would face: between singles, men’s doubles and now mixed doubles, if he reached the three finals he would have played 15 games in eight days under the warm weather in Rio de Janeiro.

Federer will be paired with Stanislas Wawrinka in the men’s doubles, while Hingis and Belinda Bencic will represent Switzerland in the women’s doubles competition.

Swiss team coach Severin Luthi has his head in the clouds with the prospect of having Federer and Hingis teaming up in Rio. He said to newspaper Le Matin: “To win all the Olympic golds? Why not? We can always dream.”