Without wishing to terrify the rest of the field, it has to be said that when Serena Williams has taken an unexpected spanking anywhere in the world, she tends to come back better, stronger and fiercer than ever before.
And she took a spanking at Roland Garros a few weeks back. As the defending French Open champion, she was sent packing in two swift sets by Garbine Muguruza in the second round – and she was not happy. She was still growling about it when she got to SW19 two weeks later. When someone dared ask her how long she had taken to get over the loss in France, she shot straight back: “Who says I was over it?” Clearly not, then. And if the intrepid reporter wanted any further proof, he just needed to watch Serena’s 6-1, 6-2, 61-minute pounding of Anna Tatishvili on Tuesday. Tatishvili was as confident and as aggressive as a world No.113 could be. And Serena was utterly ruthless. The last time she got clumped in Paris back in 2012 (it was in the first round, to boot), Serena set off on a sensational run by way of compensation. She lost just three matches in the next 12 months as she swept back to the top of the rankings and collected Grand Slam titles like they were going out of fashion. It may be expecting a lot to ask her to repeat a season like that but Serena certainly had her game face on when she began her campaign on Centre Court. She meant business from the start. For 10 whole minutes, Tatishvili was in with a chance.
She applied the thumbscrews to Serena’s opening service game; she had a handful of break points on her racket strings. And then Serena held and the former champion’s minor crisis was over. Five minutes later, Tatishvili was still throwing everything but the kitchen sink at her ferocious rival but she was 3-0 down and her chance had gone.
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario