Williams as good as ever in advancing to semis
Venus has looked anything but long in the tooth in pursuit of her sixth title
WIMBLEDON— An underdog, a sleek greyhound and a much-decorated best-in-show.
Not that we’re comparing lady tennis players to canines, which sounds disrespectful or even anthropomorphic appropriation. Just metaphorically speaking, like.
That would be Slovak Magdalena Rybarikova, Spanish-Venezuelan Garbine Muguruza and the one, the only, the eternal Venus Williams, all of whom on Tuesday joined British No. 1 Johanna Konta as survivalists into the Wimbledon semifinals.
In the pregnancy absence of younger sister Serena, a revived Williams is back to where she is so accustomed to being, albeit not for nearly a decade — eight years removed from her last final — and two decades since her debut at the All England Club. Put another way, that would have been mere weeks before the birth of Jelena Ostapenko, Williams’ two-set victim in yesterday’s quarters.
“I feel quite capable, to be honest, and powerful,” the 37-year-old Williams said in the aftermath of her 6-3, 7-5 match against the upstart French Open champion, who ran out of grand slam magic but served notice here that Roland Garros was no oneoff fluke.
Meanwhile Williams keeps fielding questions about her long-tooth status, the oldest female to reach the final four since Martina Navratilova in 1994.
“So, whatever age that is, as long as I feel like that, then I know that I can contend for titles every time.”
Williams looks dominant and titleworthy, following a long autoimmune illness-impacted period when she moved to the periphery of the sport, tumbling to a world ranking of 103, though never remotely contemplating retirement. In resurgence, however, Williams, elevated again to the top 10, made it to the Australian Open final in January, losing to her sibling, who was already with child but didn’t know it.
It’s easy to reduce Venus Williams to a compendium of numbers. Except they are staggering: five-time Wimbledon champion, competing at SW19 for the 20th time, one win away from her ninth final here, in pursuit of her eighth Grand Slam title — which would be her first since 2008 — and nailing her 100th singles match in the match with Ostapenko.
“She was serving really well, which made it very tough to break,” Ostapenko understated. “Because of that I had more pressure to keep serve. I was not feeling nervous. I just couldn’t play my best.”
Williams next meets Konta, having the slam-bang of her life in front of a delighted home crowd.
Thursday’s other semi will feature the seventh-seeded Muguruza, the 2015 runner-up, against the unseeded outlier Rybarikova — a rescue dog, if you will, who returned to tennis in February after seven months recovering from wrist and knee surgeries.
“I really cannot believe it,’’ gasped the 87th-ranked Rybarikova, the eighth lowest ranked slam semifinalist in history. “I would never believe I could reach the semifinal of this tournament. I am so happy and grateful.
“It was a very difficult time over the last year with my injuries but now everything has paid off. It is incredible. I am speechless.”
Rybarikova loves grass, with four titles on that surface since picking up a competitive racquet again. The surface benefits her booming ground strokes, one of the strengths that Co- co Vandeweghe of the U.S. couldn’t blunt in yesterday’s 6-3, 6-3 defeat. Vandeweghe did burnish Ugly American bona fides in a temperamental confrontation with the chair umpire over a line call: “Have you ever played tennis? Are you serious?!”
This match had begun on court 1 but was moved at 2-2 to the covered centre court when it started raining rain. Officials had been severely criticized the previous evening for not shifting the Novak Djokovic-Adrian Mannarino match indoors. They had to wait for the completion of the marathon between Rafael Nadal and Gilles Muller on court 1 despite the floodlit centre court being empty. Then it was too dark and too late.
Even Mrs. Djokovic was miffed as the timing disrupted the couple’s anniversary plans. She tweeted on Monday: “Hmmm. Change of plans again @Wimbledon?” Thus three-time Wimbledon champion Djokovic had to come back on Tuesday to see off Mannarino 6-2, 7-6(5), 6-4. It also means the Serb will have less time to recover than the other men’s semifinalists.
“I was not happy to not play last night. I wanted to play, I thought we could have played. We were kept for two and a half hours in the dark, in a way, without knowing what we were going to do. The referee’s office was completely indecisive.”