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WIMBLEDON, England—A deepened understanding of the two
human beings who comprise the Williams sisters became
available Saturday at the All-England Club, where Venus
Williams won with a muted celebration and Serena
Williams lost with a telling despondency.
When
their high-quality Wimbledon final in swirling Centre
Court wind ended, and when Venus Williams won her fifth
Wimbledon title by 7-5, 6-4, their identities as older
sister and younger sister did resonate.
Venus
Williams, older sister, said she played with persistent
awareness of her opponent because, “At no point am I
ever able to forget Serena, because I have the ultimate
respect for her game and I have a lot of respect for her
serve. If I was playing anyone else I wouldn’t have to
face what I had to face today, so it’s impossible to
forget.”
With an
opposite reaction, Serena Williams, coddled younger
sister, said, “It’s definitely not any easier. I just
look at her as another opponent at the end of the
day”—this, just days after saying losses to her sister
hurt less.
She then
continued moping.
Asked
for impressions of her sister’s five titles, Serena
Williams said, “Well, it says a lot about her, I mean,
she’s won five Wimbledons now. She’s beaten me on grass
now, so that definitely says a lot.”
It
definitely says that a player who has won five
Wimbledons has beaten a player who has won two.
In those
observations and in others lurked a partial explanation
for Serena Williams’s unmitigated dominance over her
sister in their five grand-slam finals between the 2002
French Open and Wimbledon 2003. Clearly, it owed
something to a greater ruthlessness, a greater ability
to forget the love for the person across the net.
Asked if
she were happy for her sister, Serena Williams said,
“Yeah, of course,” but in a tone so sullen it suggested
that, as the self-proclaimed baby of the family, she
hadn’t labored over the question.
Asked to
speculate on her reaction had Serena Williams won, Venus
Williams said, “I think I would have been happy for her.
I would have been more disappointed...about the number.
Like five”—titles—“is really monumental. Like last year,
I thought four was incredible, but now five is—I would
have been more disappointed about not being able to make
the history than actually not winning the match, if that
makes any sense.”
The
protector, Venus Williams, 28, said of losing in the
past, “The times I lost, I tried. She put a ton of
pressure on me. She hit my best serve back for winners,
just was unbelievable, and she just played better. So
there was not much I could do. I tried.”
The
protected, Serena Williams, 26, said of losing when told
she didn’t look happy, “I don’t? I wonder why.”
“I mean,
I was out there playing for Serena, you know,” she said.
In their
first collective grand-slam final in five years, Venus
Williams had engaged in some trend-bucking. She had
pared the 8-5 lead Serena Williams once had in
grand-slam titles to 8-7 in Serena’s favor. She had
evened their all-time series at 8-8. She had joined the
1880s superstars Charlotte Dod and Charlotte Cooper
Sterry among those with five Wimbledon singles titles,
and come up one shy of 20th-century mastodons like
Billie Jean King and Suzanne Lenglen. She had done so
with King and Martina Navratilova in the royal box.
What’s
more, she had blunted a bit of the thrust she took from
her own sister five and six years earlier, as if she
realized her sister would be fine and decided to gather
more of her own trophies and plates.
She knew
the statistics.
“Obviously, today, I wanted to try to improve that
record, and I didn’t want the same trend to keep
happening and then be, like, 6-1,” Venus Williams said.
“So I climbed a tiny little notch up, so it’s 2-5. Still
behind, but I’m working on it.”
At the
outset, Serena Williams had seemed imperious, leading
2-0 and 4-2. She also had slugged a passing shot in the
third game right toward Venus Williams who, at the net,
quickly dodged it and blocked a backhand volley into the
open court for a winner.
Venus
Williams had come back, through a mammoth four-deuce
game at 4-4, and through a Tolstoy seven-deuce game at
1-1 in the second set. Finally, they stayed on serve
until Serena Williams came to 4-5, and Venus Williams
shrieked and screamed with obvious intent through a
12-shot rally, using a backhand that traveled a tight
angle to set up a blast of a backhand winner up the line
into the corner to set up two match points.
From
there, Serena Williams saved one match point, but on the
second, a seven-shot rally ended with Serena’s backhand
floating wide, landing amid the doubles lane and sending
Venus Williams into a. . .
Well,
into a brief raise of her arms, followed by a quick
lowering of same arms and a trot to the net for a hug
which Serena Williams, so accustomed to triumph, barely
returned.
“Of
course when I saw it go wide, I’m thinking, Oh my god,
it’s five. Wow,” Venus Williams said. They’d amassed 157
points each, but she had proved stouter on the pivotal
points, and had served to the body so much that Serena
Williams said she’d be ready for it next time. With her
sister already 26 and established, she’d willed some
achievement of her own, with the new twist in the
rivalry downright telltale. |
