WIMLEDON CHAMPIONSHIPS VENUS WILLIAMS:Twelve years after first winning at Wimbledon, Venus Williams tells DONALD MCRAEtime has not dulled her desire to win at the All England Club
‘DO I HAVE to?” Venus Williams sighs in mock outrage when she is asked to remember her first appearance at Wimbledon 12 years ago. “It was a very long time ago,” murmurs the woman who, having won five of the past nine singles titles on the grass of southwest London, is now aiming for a slice of personal history by completing a hat-trick of successive championship victories.
Williams has once before been on the brink of winning Wimbledon three consecutive times and so her desire to look forward, rather than back, can be understood in the context of both a remarkable career and a singular approach to a life of sporting stardom. And yet, typically, she then lets slip a languid giggle and returns to the bruised origins of her love affair with Wimbledon.
“It’s not a great memory. It was 1997 and my first match at Wimbledon [against Poland’s Magdalena Grzybowska] was scheduled for the Tuesday and it ended up being played on the Saturday. It rained and rained and every day was a new trial. I’d be scheduled for court 14 and then the next day I’d be expected on court 18. Each day was a new court and a new wait.
“When we eventually started I was in charge [and leading 6-4, 2-0] but I didn’t know how to close out a match. I hadn’t learnt how to win and so that was the end of my first Wimbledon. I was out in the first round but it was never a case of me thinking ‘What’s the big deal about this tournament?’ I just hated losing at Wimbledon.”
That burning compulsion not to lose, at the tournament that has always meant most to her, initially seems at odds with the laconic and occasionally near-horizontal persona Williams adopts in most interviews and enforced public encounters on the Sony Ericsson WTA circuit. She only stirs herself occasionally to reach into the more animated depths of the driven character that will emerge again when she begins her regal defence of a title that has also been won twice by her sister Serena – whose victories in the 2002 and 2003 finals were both against Venus.
But when she finally allows a vivid glimpse of her passion for Wimbledon it becomes easy to understand why Venus seems so convinced about her chances of winning again this year – even if she will probably be seeded only third behind Serena and the current world number one, Dinara Safina.
“At Wimbledon I’m always pro-Venus,” she says with quiet amusement, as if she might get a little kick out of subverting the sporting icon’s trick of talking about herself in the third person. Williams is too relaxed and confident to be on anything but first-name terms with herself.
“My outlook is very pro-Venus. That’s the best way to sum me up at Wimbledon. I’m always banking on my ability to get through. If Serena and I are healthy then it feels great because you can’t look too far beyond either of us as the winner.”
This is almost certainly the problem with women’s tennis, if not the Williams family, and explains why the female side of the sport is in some decline – especially compared to the vibrant men’s game. The raging battle for supremacy between Roger Federer and Rafa Nadal has been given further depth by the rise of players as varied as Andy Murray, Novak Djokovic and Juan Martin del Potro. Another fascinating clash between the reigning Wimbledon champion, Nadal, and Federer, pursuing a record-breaking 15th grand slam, is made still more intriguing by the prospect of Murray becoming the first British winner since 1936.
The women’s draw, however, is dominated by the Williams sisters and deflated by a public assumption that none of the three Wimbledon finals they have contested against each other sticks in the memory. Yet last July they produced a match of startling quality – and the way in which Venus served into Serena’s body, at speeds around 125mph, ridiculed long-standing claims their matches are always tepid affairs. A routine 7-5, 6-4 winning scoreline for Venus could not obscure the fact the sisters had played exceptionally and with real competitive zeal. Serena looked devastated as she watched Venus lift the old Rosewater Dish.
That victory offered definitive proof that Venus had taken women’s tennis to a new level of speed, strength and technique on grass – illustrated most simply by the fact that, at last year’s championships, she had a higher average serving speed then either Nadal or Federer.
“I wasn’t that surprised,” she says, “because the style of my serve is always going to put some real speed on the ball. I hit big flat serves and I pretty much go for my first serve every time. The men probably work on placement a little more.”
Six years ago, when she was still only 22, Williams achieved a feat that Federer only celebrated earlier this month when he finally won the French Open to complete his full set of Grand Slam titles. Williams won the Australian Open in 2003, following her earlier Wimbledon, US Open and French championships – but the anomaly in her record is the huge tilt towards Wimbledon. She has won the US Open twice, and the Australian and French once each.
“It seems apparent,” she drawls, “that I have more passion for Wimbledon. I loved watching it as a girl and getting hooked on [Boris] Becker and [Stefan] Edberg, [Martina] Navratilova and [Steffi] Graf. And I’m obviously a very aggressive tennis player – so grass suits my game. Of course each year is different. I’ve had years coming back from injury or when my ranking was way down [as in 2007 when she won Wimbledon as the number 23 seed] but one thing stays the same. I love winning at Wimbledon.
“In fact I hate losing at those championships more than any other tournament.”
This year it is an indictment of Venus and Serena’s rivals that Maria Sharapova is regarded as third favourite for the title, despite her tentative return from a 10-month break forced by a serious shoulder injury. The odds on an eighth Wimbledon title for the Williams sisters this decade are predictably short – and Venus admits the prospect of a third straight championship will add yet more bite to her habitual desire.
Despite the quality of last year, Williams settles on an unforgettable final, from 2005, as her personal Wimbledon favourite – when she won the longest women’s singles final in history by defeating Lindsay Davenport 4-6, 7-6, 9-7. “I suppose it is telling that that is the one replica Wimbledon trophy I keep next to my bed. It was such a draining and memorable match.”
Williams also takes particular satisfaction from the role she played in securing equal prize-money for women at Wimbledon in 2007 – having carried forward Billie Jean King’s pioneering role with a sustained campaign to secure a symbolic victory for gender equality.
“It gives me pride – because it took many, many years to win that battle. Billie Jean started it and she was still there when we finally won it. It definitely felt like quite an accomplishment.”
Venus and Serena can still be frustrating and even infuriating in their more usual determination to follow their own agenda, deciding to pick and choose where and when they play. They will also not deign to turn on their considerable charm unless it really suits them – but they stand apart as assured and rounded individuals when set against the apparently one-dimensional army of journeywomen now swamping the WTA tour.
“Playing tennis gives you lots of opportunities to do other things in life,” Williams says. “But it is a lifestyle for me rather than just a closed career. This is testament to my dad. He always taught me and Serena the importance of having a life outside tennis. And that’s something I really do understand. I know exactly who I am.”
Williams tells an illuminating story of how she flew back economy class from losing early in the French Open last year – and being thoroughly entertained by an opera singer in the next seat – by insisting she can no longer remember travelling home after defeat in the third round at Paris a few weeks ago.
“I obviously didn’t get the result I wanted at the French but I learned a lot.” She chuckles dryly when asked to explain this latest specific lesson. “I can’t say.”
It must be summer, and Wimbledon, if the enduringly powerful but maddeningly elusive Williams sisters are back in town – presumably for yet another title-winning chapter in their distinctive family story.
“It’s good career planning basically. That’s why as long as I’m feeling great, for the next four or five years, I’ll keep going.”
And that’s exactly what her father, Richard, promised her and Serena all those years ago when he planned their multiple grand slam-winning careers and insisted their success would be framed by personal satisfaction and a strong maverick streak.
“He always said we would win Wimbledon,” Venus remembers. “Most of the things he said would happen have happened. He was very good at predicting.”
This year the standard prediction does not need to be made by her father. She might love her sister to bits but the prospect of a third successive title, and her sixth in total, encourages one last murmur from the defending champion: “I know how to play this tournament. I know what to do to win and I’ve got the game to do it again. Yeah, like always, I’m pro-Venus.”
Guardian service
