While acknowledging that Venus and Serena Williams are "great for the game and they make tennis more popular," the top-ranked Hingis said Tuesday, "it's not only them, it's like a hundred players on the WTA Tour."
"You can't really tell which players should get more of the money or TV rights or whatever," said Hingis from the season-ending Chase Championships, an event both of the Williams sisters pulled out of. "It's the WTA Tour and you have to follow the rules."
"Definitely some people sometimes feel like they deserve more," added Hingis, who has earned more than $14 million in career prize money.
The outspoken father and coach of tennis stars and millionaires Venus and Serena Williams told the New York Times in a story published on Tuesday that the sensational siblings had dominated the sport's major events, generated higher television ratings and revenue and deserve a cut over and above their tournament prize money.
"From our standpoint, when you look at the ratings when Venus and Serena play, they are extremely high," Williams said in the telephone interview with the Times. "I think the Tour has been able to benefit from that.
"I think the people who have helped the Tour to get to where it is now, you should want to share some of that with them instead of keeping it all to yourself," Richard Williams said.
"Everybody has the right to their own opinion," said the glamorous and fantastically popular Kournikova, who acted as if Williams's comments were to be treated more as entertainment than taken seriously, and insisted that he would not get his way.
"Of course there are players that do attract more attention than the others," she said knowingly.
But the 19-year-old with the covergirl looks who creates a fan frenzy wherever she goes, said: "The Tour is the Tour.
"We all belong to the Tour, so we're just going to have to wait and see what he's going to do next."