We go again
Serena mounts another bid for record title
Astellar doubles team are taking the court in Auckland this morning. Two grand-slam champions. Two former world No 1s. Caroline Wozniacki rarely has to play second fiddle, but at this week’s ASB Classic, she has had Serena Williams at her side.
The timing is piquant, because Wozniacki will be stepping into retirement at the end of this month. At 29, she has developed an auto-immune disease – rheumatoid arthritis – and wants to start a family with her new husband David Lee.
Williams, by contrast, will continue her pursuit of a 24th major title in Melbourne in a fortnight. This is the target she has pursued for the past year and a half: the record of 1970s giant Margaret Court (who, incidentally, is due to attend this year’s Australian Open, much to the frustration of LGBQT groups who object to her oft-stated homophobia).
At 38, Williams is significantly older than Wozniacki. She already has a family, in the winsome shape of two-year-old daughter Alexis Olympia. And she is suffering from a significant loss of cartilage in at least one of her knees, according to her coach Patrick Mouratoglou.
Most people would have called time long ago. But Williams is relentless. Recently named as the female athlete of the decade by American media giant Associated Press, she has never seen a target that she did not expect to hit. In this context, the four defeats she has suffered in her past four grand-slam finals feel like an aberration.
The most recent of those losses came against 19-year-old Bianca Andreescu in New York in September, in a match that proved to be Williams’s last of the season. As she ducked out of view for four months, some might have wondered whether she had finally reached the end of her tolerance.
But such notions have been resoundingly quashed in Auckland over the past week. Williams dropped only one set on her path to the singles final against world No 82 Jessie Pegula. (Because of the 13-hour time difference, the match will probably have been played by the time you read this.) In yesterday’s semi-final, she took on a fast-rising star in 18-year-old Amanda Anisimova, and schooled her so convincingly that the match took just 43 minutes.
“I was definitely in the zone today. It was just one of those days,” Williams told the on-court interviewer. “It feels good. I’ve been working really hard for a couple of years – my daughter is only two – and I seem to be really hard on myself. But considering everything it’s really good.”
In the doubles, meanwhile, Williams and Wozniacki have been even more untroubled on their way to today’s final against two other American players: Taylor Townsend and Asia Muhammad. The fact that Williams has taken on so many commitments in Auckland offers a glimpse into her mindset.
She is clearly confident in her physical preparations. Only the discipline of match-play was missing from her resume.
Asked earlier in the week if she felt as if she was getting into optimal shape ahead of Melbourne, Williams replied: “I definitely feel that … especially the match fitness – I’m super fit, but match fitness is a little different, so I think all these matches are really helping.”
How different this week has been from Williams’s only other visit to Auckland, in 2017. She was six-weeks pregnant with her daughter at the time, though she did not know it, and in a terrible temper throughout. When she lost to underpowered American grinder Madison Brengle in the second round, making 88 unforced errors on a blustery day, she complained about “the least favourite conditions I’ve ever played in” and made it clear that she could not wait to get to Australia.
She left under a cloud, attracting scornful columns in the New Zealand press for her surly attitude. But her agent, Jill Smoller, arranged a clearthe-air meeting with Auckland tournament director Karl Budge in Melbourne a few weeks later, laying the groundwork for a rapprochement.
This time around, her mood could hardly have been sunnier. She even joked about how she had hated her future husband, Alexis Ohanian, during that 2017 trip. “I was like, ‘I can’t stand you and I don’t know why’ … It was like, ‘There’s something about your smell, I don’t like your smell’.”
Such gripes have since dissolved, and Williams now seems to be on first-name terms with the New Zealand reporters. Even so, she was not so relaxed that she was prepared to address the intrigue surrounding her friend Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex. When asked about the latest royal developments, she replied simply: “Oh I am not touching that – so thank you.”
Williams’s smooth progress this week has contrasted with the struggles of her one-time rival Maria Sharapova, who has now fallen so low in the rankings – at No147 – that she had to be granted a wild card for the Australian Open.
Playing at the Brisbane International, Sharapova lost to the little-known American, Jennifer Brady, in the first round. Although this result did look a little better when Brady then beat world No1 Ashleigh Barty in her next match.
Meanwhile, Andreescu disappointed the world of tennis yesterday when she announced that she would not be at the Australian Open because of a knee injury.
“It was a very tough decision to make as I love to play in Melbourne,” said Andreescu in a statement, “but I have to respect the recuperation plan.”
‘I’ve been working hard for a couple of years – my daughter is only two – but I feel really good’