When Serena and Venus Williams lost Monday afternoon at Wimbledon, it probably came as something of a shock to the men who set betting odds for a living or to tennis journalists whose newspapers or magazines have grabbed the closest available body and told them to cover the tournament, even if they don’t know a butt cap from an overgrip.
But if you played the game, still play the game or simply have been around tennis long enough to know the dynamics of what it takes to win a major, you would have found it more than slightly amusing a week ago if someone had told you one of the sisters was going to Wimbledon.
If you’re placing a wager or just betting dinner with your doubles partner, you’re unwise to grasp at the magic names of “Serena” and “Venus” and think, at their ages, they can just walk into a Grand Slam and, virtually cold turkey, win it merely because their surnames are Williams.
I’m not gloating here. OK, maybe a little. But here’s the salient part of my Wimbledon forecast more than a week ago:
“Venus gets the heavy hitting Akgul Amanmuradova in the opener and Jelena Jankovic is a probable third-round opponent. It’s extremely unlikely that one of the sisters will win this tournament and about 50-50 that neither makes it to the second week. How long Venus and Serena last in this tournament with rust dripping off their 30- and near-30-something bodies is a legitimate question.”
I wasn’t perfect. They made the second week. . . . barely.
If they were five years younger, I would have had to think twice about suggesting they wouldn’t reach the quarters. But Venus just turned 31 and Serena will hit 30 on Sept. 26. The body doesn’t respond the way it used to, even for great athletes like the Williamses, and especially not after the succession of injuries they’ve had.
Furthermore, as debilitated as the women’s tour is right now with Justine Henin re-retired and Kim Clijsters ready to join her, there are no gimmes out there from the third round on if you’re not seeded in the top four.
Marion Bartoli may look goofy out there with all the schtick she goes through before serving and with her two-handed backhand AND forehand, but she’s been to the Wimbledon final. She has great accuracy and that deceptive serve of hers was good enough on Day 9 to win 80 percent of her first serves and allow Serena only one break in a 6-3, 7-6 (6) win.
Meanwhile, Venus lost 6-2, 6-3 to Tsvetana Pironkova, the human wall who coaxed Williams into lots of long rallies and won most of them. Venus and Serena can tell any number of gullible reporters that they’re fully recovered from their sundry ailments and 100 percent fit, and, strictly speaking, that might be true. But I can tell you from long years of experience in this sport and countless conversations with players that if you’ve got joint injuries, as the matches build up over a limited period of time, those knees or shoulders or elbows or wrists begin throbbing.
Plus, this was the second time Pironkova has beaten Venus is a Slam, having won in three at the 2008 Australian Open. This should have been a 50-50 match at best on the betting line. Pironkova is only 23 years old and ranked No. 33. She has a future. Venus Williams has a past and while she still has a future, those glory days in the winner’s circle are no longer there.
The last time she won a significant tournament with a star-studded field was at Dubai in February of 2009.
As for Serena, she’s younger, but she’s also got intermittent injury problems, though whatever happened to her foot in that German restaurant months ago didn’t seem to affect her movement in the opening week. She’s just rusty.
Serena probably is the greatest woman player in the history of tennis, but no matter how great you were, if you can’t stay relatively free of injury this game will suck the life out of you. Even if your name is Venus or Serena.