From
the moment Venus and Serena Williams appeared on the Grand Slam scene
in the late 1990s, they’ve been winning titles and transcending tennis,
becoming red-carpet celebrities as much as sports stars.
Every
so often, like all elite athletes, they’ve heard questions about
whether their best days were behind them, whether health problems or
off-court distractions were taking their toll. And each time, it seemed,
one or the other – or sometimes, amazingly, both – would promptly reach
a major final, as if to say, “Hey, don’t count us out yet.”
Now
that each is past her 30th birthday, and big victories are less
frequent than ever, those questions are bound to get more persistent,
especially after this week. The 2012 French Open has been the worst
Grand Slam tournament in Williams family history, the first of the 43
that both entered at which neither reached the third round.
They’ve
always been each other’s fiercest rival and best friend, ever since
they emerged as teenagers from Compton, California, coached by a father
who taught himself tennis by watching instructional videos. They were
siblings who competed with each other for top billing in their own home
and the entire globe – and with 120 mph serves and punishing
groundstroke’s, they ushered in a new brand of power-based play.
Both have been No 1 in the WTA rankings, but Serena is now No 5, and Venus is No 53.
They
have played each other in eight Grand Slam finals (Serena leads 6-2),
including four in a row from 2002-03, but none since Wimbledon in 2009.
Serena’s
title at the All England Club the next year was the last at a Grand
Slam tournament for either Williams; a few days later, she cut her feet
on glass at a restaurant, leading to a series of complications,
including blood clots on her lung.
Her latest issue was a bad back, although she refused to blame that for her loss to Razzano.
“I’ve just got to … figure out what I did wrong and not do it again,” Serena said. “You know, learn from it.”
The world will be watching when Wimbledon begins next month to find out if that’s still the case
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