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The French Open provided a lot of excitement earlier this month, but Wimbledon is setting up some heart-racing story lines as well. It's been a bumpy road for the women's tour lately so it will be interesting to see how things shake out at the All England Club.
Wimbledon remains the only major still contested on grass and it is a vastly different game than the one played on the red clay at Roland Garros or the blue hardcourt in Melbourne. Players who win a final on Wimbledon's Centre Court realize a lifelong dream as it is the oldest, and considered the most prestigious, of the four Grand Slam championships.
Held in the suburbs of London, Wimbledon is well-known for its pomp and circumstance including the very British afternoon tea, scones, clotted cream and strawberries along with a perfectly manicured grounds, trimmed topiaries and a strict all-white dress code. Don't be fooled however. With all the tradition there's still plenty of wild action at Wimbledon. Who, and what stories, will we be watching for this year?
Image Credit: ZUMApress.com
Venus & Serena
The big question for The Championships is whether the Williams sisters, who have both had extended absences from the game due to serious health issues, will restore balance to the topsy-turvy women's competition?
Venus and Serena can't really be compared to any other women on the tour because this sister act is just so darn dominant. The pair have won nine of the past 11 Wimbledon finals. In that time, only two other women have taken home the title (Amelie Mauresmo in 2006 and Maria Sharapova in 2004). In fact, the 10 top-ranked players have just nine major titles between them.
There are only five women in tennis history who have won more major singles championships than Serena. (Trivia time: Who are they? Margaret Court (24), Steffi Graf (22), Helen Wills Moody (19), Chris Evert (18) and Martina Navratilova (18)). Among active players, Serena ranks No. 1 with 13 wins, followed by Venus with seven.
In this year's women's draw, the seventh-seeded Serena and big sister Venus are in opposite halves, setting up the possibility for a fifth sibling final at the All England Club. Such a match could provide a big boost for U.S. television. The 2008 Venus Williams' straight-set victory over sister Serena had a 3.4 rating and a 10 share on NBC.
Serena, who has won four Wimbledon titles, is 3-1 against five-time champion Venus in the final match. Twenty-nine year-old Serena may be more of a threat than Venus, who turned 31 on Friday, because she is a better all-around player who excels on grass.
The big question on everyone's mind is whether Serena can draw on her super powers after such a long absence. She has played only two matches since winning Wimbledon last year due to life-threatening complications from an injury. Just four months ago, she was on what she calls her "death bed," laboring to breathe because of blood clots on her lungs. Before that, Serena sliced open right foot open on a shard of glass at a restaurant, severing two tendons, then had double surgery to repair the damage and was in a cast for 20 weeks.
Serena returned to play in Eastbourne this week for her Wimbledon warm-up, and while her game and fitness weren't what we're used to seeing, she showed she can still dig as deep as ever. She managed to recover from a 1-6 first set to beat Tsvetana Pironkova before losing in three sets (3-6, 7-6 (5), 7-5) to No. 3-ranked Vera Zvonareva in an improved second round.
As the defending Wimbledon champion, Serena's first-round match will open play on Centre Court on Tuesday. The former world No. 1 will play France's Aravane Rezai and could meet former Wimbledon runner-up Marion Bartoli in the fourth round in the top half of the draw. The ninth-seeded French Bartoli lost to Venus in the 2007 finale.
Venus also returned to the courts this week in Eastbourne, after being sidelined with a hip injury for almost five months. She lost to Daniela Hantuchova in the quarterfinals. Zvonareva, the new no.2 seed at Wimbledon, could meet Venus, who has been seeded 22nd, in the fourth round.
