WIMBLEDON, SATURDAY, JULY 4 – Go figure. Serena Williams has won three of the last four Slams. Can you spell dominance? Yet guess what, on the all-knowing WTA Tour computer she is still No. 2, while Dinara Safina who has been stinking up the gym
at crunch time in one Slam after another is camping out at No. 1.
And never mind that the Russian was punished by Venus 6-1, 6-0 in the semis. Early in the clay court season in Rome, Serena scoffed at the notion that the far –from-dominant Russian, saying “everyone knows I’m No.1.” Touche!
But Serena quickly and dutifully cleaned up her act, so to speak, and blew many a kiss to Dinara, offering one PR-crafted kudo after another to Safina. But all that came crashing down in Serena’s semi-sureal press conference after her impressive 7-6 (3), 6-2 win over sister Venus to collect her third Wimbledon crown.
After brazenly walking into her post match press conference with a form-fitting T-shirt that asked the immortal question “are you looking at my titles?”, reporters quipped “nice shirt.”
Then a Italian writer asked: “May you tell us a little bit more about that shirt … If you had lost, was there another shirt, or that was for your sister?
Serena responded, “I thought last night when I was getting my stuff together … Well, if I win, I’ll wear this ’cause I’ll have 11 titles, and I wouldn’t know if you guys were looking at my titles or my Gatorade bottle.”
Her answer prompted a reporter to ask how important is it to regain the No. 1 ranking. Fresh off her win, Serena was in no mood to spin feel-good comments about the fact that she was No. 2, despite all her recent Slam domination. “You know, I’m not super motivated. I think if you hold three Grand Slam titles maybe you should be No. 1, but not on the WTA Tour obviously, so my motivation is just to win another Grand Slam and stay No. 2, I guess.
Asked if that disappointed her, she replied: “No. If it did, I would go crazy just thinking about it. I think anyone really could. That’s just shocking. But whatever. It is what it is. I’d rather definitely be No. 2 and hold three Grand Slams in the past year than be No. 1 and not have any.”
“Do you see yourself as No. 1,” she was asked. She replied, “I see myself as No. 2. That’s where I am.”
And than, she delivered one of the great zingers in memory, saying “I think Dinara did a great job to get to No. 1. She won Rome and Madrid. She then doubled over in howls of laughter.
Inside Tennis then asked if the rankings system could be changed. Serena – who rarely puts up huge results in between the majors anymore — than praised Safina for her hard work and added: “maybe if I’d have done better at the French Open (where she fell to Kuznetsova in the quarters), like got to the semifinals, maybe things would have been different … I’m really excited that I won Wimbledon, because I’d rather win that than not win the Championships … I don’t know what can be changed. I feel like I’ve had a pretty consistent year … I haven’t lost too early. I got a little injured, but I fought through it … But I don’t know what to do to be No. 1. I don’t even care anymore. I’m just happy to be here.”
Top Ten Venus and Serena Questions
1. Are the Williams sisters – who now have won 8 of the last 10 Wimbledons, and a total of 18 Slams (11 for Serena and seven for Venus) – the best sports stars of our generation or any generation? It would be like Tiger having a brother who pushed him throughout his career.
2. Is Richard Williams proclamation that his daughters would revolutionize tennis and become the number one and two players in tennis (and that Serena would be better), the best sports prediction in history?
3. Which Williams criticism is the most ill-founded? That they don’t play grass court warm-up tournaments before Wimbledon; that they should have played more tournaments as juniors; they have squandered their talent because of a lack of commitment; they need a coach.
4. How absurd does it now seem that it was once widely speculated that it was a family decision as to who would win when the sisters played?
5. The sisters have brought plenty of sizzle to tennis, like when they played the first prime time woman’s final at the U.S. Open. But where has been the Williams effect: i.e. how come no top-level, elite African-Americans have emerged in their wake?
6. How helpful has it been that Venus and Serena have navigated pro tennis as sisters, supporters, roommates and practice partners?
7. How cool is it that in so many ways Venus and Serena are opposites: think introvert vs. extrovert, elegant, tall and sleek vs. stocky, strong; imposing backhand vs. killer forehand; old school visor vs. broad headband. Okay, this is silly. But how many hundreds of thousands of balls have they stroked with each other.
8. Which desert miracle will come first, peace throughout the Middle East or the Williams returning to Indian Wells to play in one of America’s great tournaments?
9. When all is said and done, outside of Indian Wells, what controversy will we most remember? Justine Henin refusing to recognize Serena’s ‘wait a minute’ gesture at the French Open as she continued to serve when Serena wasn’t set; Serena getting the shorter end of a bad call against Jennifer Capriati at the U.S. Open (which led to the introduction of the electronic scoring system) or the infamous “bump” when Irina Spirlea refused to get out of Venus’ way at the ’97 U.S. Open which prompted Richard Williams to call her “an ugly white turkey.”
10. What about the future? How long will the sisters go on playing? They say they want to play doubles in the 2016 Olympics if it comes to Chicago. How many major titles will they end up with and will Serena enter the conversation with Steffi Graf and Martina Navratilova as to who is the greatest of all time?
As an aside, have the sisters become the best doubles players in the game now. (They beat the Chinese former Wimbledon champions Zi Yan and Jie Zheng 6-0, 6-0 and the No. 1 seeds Cara Black and Liezel Huber 6-1, 6-2) And if they seriously approached dubs, would they be able to accumulate stats like Martina Navratilova and Pam Shriver?
