Conditions in Melbourne have been less than ideal for tennis, with continual rain and strong winds over the last two weeks. In other years, the temperature has exceeded 104 degrees and players have suffered heat exhaustion.

"I think it's very good to have these different options if it rains because the weather has been just terrible here," this week, Hingis said.

Having a roof "it's great, because you don't have to wait around forever and just like Wimbledon sometimes or the French Open ... it always happens that during those two weeks, one or two days it rains and it's not much fun."

With the retractable roof on center court, "you always know you get to play," she added.

Shorter sets might be on horizon
The WTA reportedly wants to add excitement to the women's game by experimenting with more but shorter sets. The men will decide in March if they want to try something similar.

The proposal is to play best-of-five sets in all matches instead of the current best-of-three format. Sets would be won with five games, tiebreaks would be shorter, and the fifth set would be restricted to a tiebreak or the first to reach 10 points.

WTA officials will put the suggestion to the rules committee of the International Tennis Federation in the next few months, the Daily Telegraph of London reported.

One goal of the proposal is to achieve consistency in the length of matches, making them more television-friendly. Tennis matches are often difficult for commercial programs to fit into program schedules.