Wimbledon rewards Serena with No. 25 seed
The extraordinary career of Serena Williams, the only woman to win 23 Grand Slam tournament singles titles in the Open era, spoke volumes to the Wimbledon seeding committee, which announced Wednesday that it rewarded her with the 25th seeding spot in the women’s main draw.
Wimbledon reserves the right to go off script from the rankings when doing its seedings and moved currently 183rdranked Williams, a seven-time Wimbledon champion, into a preferred position right behind 24th seed Maria Sharapova. Williams’ oldest sister, Venus, is seeded ninth.
A news release explained that the seeding order follows the WTA rankings except where “a change is necessary to produce a balanced draw.”
Wimbledon’s decision comes a month after the French Open denied Williams, a three-time champion in Paris, a seeding. Williams reached the fourth round but withdrew from her meeting with Sharapova because of a pectoral injury. She will find out her first-round opponent Friday when the draws are released.
Williams is returning to the tour after an extensive maternity leave, which started immediately after she won her 23rd Grand Slam trophy in the 2017 Australian Open. She’s played in three tournaments — Indian Wells, Miami and the French Open — since giving birth to daughter Alexis Olympia in September.
Although not seeding strictly according to ranking has been Wimbledon’s way through the years, primarily it plays musical chairs with those who are already located within the 32-spot seeding lane.
Tournament officials also made adjustments to the men’s seeding, including making eight-time Wimbledon champion and second-ranked Roger Federer top seed and bumping recent French Open champion and world No. 1 Rafael Nadal to second seed and moving recent Australian Open finalist and fifth-ranked Marin Cilic of Croatia to the third seeding spot.
The tournament begins Monday. By placing Williams into the seedings from outside the top 32, it means some player — in this case 32nd-ranked Do- minika Cibulkova of Slovakia — was bound to be unhappy having believed she was destined for seeding.
When Cibulkova, a two-time Wimbledon quarterfinalist playing this week at the Eastbourne tournament, was asked about the possibility of losing her seeding to Williams, she initially didn’t complain.
Less than an hour later, however, she returned to the media center Tuesday to lodge her revised opinion with a few journalists.
“I have the right and I should be seeded,” Cibulkova told reporters. “If they put her in front of me, then I will just lose my spot that I am supposed to have.
“My opinion about it is that I don’t think it’s fair and I don’t think it’s the right thing to do.
“It’s a really different thing if they change the seeding. If you are not seeded because of someone else they put in front of you and you deserve to have the spot that you really have, I think that’s not right. Why should I not be seeded when I have the right to be?”
Pregnancy and maternity leave are a hot topic for female players on tour — former world No. 1 and two-time Australian Open champion Victoria Azarenka is also on the comeback trail since giving birth to son Leo in December 2016. Azarenka is expected to play Wimbledon and is ranked 87th.
The United States Tennis Association has announced that it plans to take a proactive stance with seeding new mothers when appropriate. The policy is set to start at the U.S. Open in August.
“Having a player the caliber of Williams playing a major event without a number next to her name not only upsets the competitive balance of the draw, it also seems to slight the countless accomplishments of a woman who owns the most Grand Slam singles crowns in tennis’ Open era,” said Katrina Adams, the USTA chairman of the board and president, in an article on the U.S. Open website.
“Pregnancy is not injury. Having children is not a handicap. Choosing motherhood shouldn’t mean sacrificing a position that has been earned through hard work, talent and resolve.”