Less than a week ago, I said I did not think we would have an all-Williams final. I expected one of the sisters (I really didn't know which, but I was leaning toward Serena) to make it to the final, but not both. Silly me.Though Tamarine Tanasugarn had a good shot at defeating Venus, she choked and blew it away. Elena Dementieva got off to a disastrous start in her semifinal, and while she picked up her game considerably in the second set, it was not good enough to take Venus to a third set. Serena's opponent, Zheng Jie, also got off to a bad start. At 5-1 in the first set, Williams leading, the rain came. I suspected the rain delay to be a real boost for Zheng. and she came back in a much improved state. But again--she didn't have enough (though she held a set point) to take a big-serving Serena to a third set (perhaps she should have taken one of those rain delay naps that appeared to help Marion Bartoli come back after several rainstorms and kick everyone's ass).
Williams hit fourteen aces and--how strange is this for Serena?--only twelve unforced errors for the match. She had a first serve percentage of 65 (so did Zheng), a first serve win percentage of 87, and a second serve win percentage of 52. She serves like that tomorrow, and she wins the championship.
Excuse me now while I hit myself on the head and say repeatedly, "Never count out a Williams sister, never count out a Williams sister..."
6 comments:
Don't be too hard on yourself. I said Venus would lose in the quarterfinals! :)
aaress, same here! I thought JJ would be the one to knock her out. I thought she was on an every other year plan at Wimby...
I think that the quality of Saturday's match will be better than that of past match ups but time will tell.
And I've seen this discussed on other boards but would be interested in the take here about Lena D's comments. Nasty insinuation or was something lost in translation?
I wanted to modify my comment but don't know if that's possible...
After reading the statement by Dementieva, I doubt very much if she meant it the way the reporter posed the question to Venus at her presser.
I know that the media often tries to bait players against one another regardless of gender but I know that there is nothing quite like a "cat fight" :(
I thought JJ would probably beat Venus again, too, until I saw that injury, and then, of course, the subject became irrelevant. But I thought Tammy might take Venus out--and no matter what the commentators say, she very well might have if she hadn't choked something awful.
Kia,
My opinion is that something was indeed lost in translation. I don't consider it odd that the question of a fix would come up, but I doubt it that Dementieva would willingly spark up the controversy.
I've read a lot of the reports as well, and from what I gathered, this is a classic case of the media looking for a sound byte to accompany a controversial headline.
Aaress, I agree completely. I can't imagine Dementieva--even though she has said some less-than-desirable things in the past--saying anything like that. I think she meant "The final will be determined by a family" or some such thing. The media just HAS to try to stir things up among female players. I was pleased (and not surprised) to see Venus shoot them down.
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