Don’t call me past it, blasts Serena @riathalsam
SERENA WILLIAMS was subdued, bored, not especially interested in discussing her latest act of tennis violence. Then with one muddled question she took mild offence and woke up.
She had been asked if she recognised the pressures on Novak Djokovic to win each match he plays, which seemed a reasonable enough question in the context of the Serb’s unexpected fallibility. But the phrasing snagged with Williams, when it was put to her that ‘you have been in those situations’.
Aged 34 and entering her 177th straight week as world No 1, Williams is evidently not willing to talk about her best days in the past tense.
‘I am in those situations — I wouldn’t say I have been,’ she said after demolishing Annika Beck 6-3, 6-0. ‘Every time I step out on the court, if I don’t win, it’s major national news.’
This was not an obvious day for wondering if the end was nigh for Williams, such was the brutality of two sets that took only 51 minutes. The second saw the defending champion drop only four points, none on her own serve.
In a draw where few of the women are making great noises Williams, as ever, is looking like a reliable bet. It has been that way across almost two decades in which she has achieved ‘extreme history’, as she put it yesterday.
But how much more can she make? She has reached the age when it is natural to ask if she will soon lose momentum as the wrecking ball of women’s tennis. Having lost only four of her 25 singles finals in Slams before this year, she has lost two in a row at the Australian and French Opens. By the absurd standards of a player who has won 21 major titles, that is a slump. And there has been the slightest whiff of suspicion that she might have doubts in her own mind about how much further she can go.
That will be better tested as she goes deeper into this tournament. Beck was never up to the challenge, despite landing a break early in the match. Her first serves of 85mph were routinely smashed to all corners by the six-time champion. Beck looked like a little girl in the presence of the most formidable woman to play the sport.
Williams moves on to the sterner prospect of 13th seed Svetlana Kuznetsova, who has beaten the American in two of their past three matches. Williams said: ‘We have played a lot. She’s won a lot. I have won a lot. We are both ready for this match, we’re both going to give it our heart, as we always do when we play each other. She knows my game and I know her game. Then it’s just down to who is really going to fight to win it.’
Fighting is the one thing that can be guaranteed with Williams, as was shown when she thought she was being called a has-been. You wouldn’t bet against her in the fight with age, either.