Serena Williams, who won the Olympic singles title in London four years ago, was stunned by Ukraine’s Elina Svitolina in the third round of the Rio Olympics on Tuesday.
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Like Graf in 1988, Williams captured the Golden Slam in 2012 by winning the Olympic singles title to go along with titles in the four Grand Slams – the Australian Open, the French Open, Wimbledon and the U.S. Open.
The 34-year-old Williams also suffered a surprise defeat in the women’s doubles tournament with her older sister Venus on Sunday night.
Britain’s Murray and Spain’s Nadal could only meet in the gold-medal final or bronze-medal match – and they don’t need to worry about dealing with No. 1 Novak Djokovic, a 12-time major champion who lost in the first round to 2009 U.S. Open victor Juan Martin del Potro. Already out of the doubles with sister Venus, Serena said getting to Brazil had been an achievement.
Ukraine’s Svitolina beat Williams with a score of 6-4 6-3. Williams banged down a big serve for 5-4 and thus put the pressure on Svitolina to serve out the set.
Serena pulled out of a tournament in Montreal two weeks prior to the Olympics with a shoulder problem and it appears that has resurfaced. She then resorted to serving at two-thirds speed, yet not even that helped as she double-faulted a fourth and fifth time in the same game to hand a service break to Svitolina. “I was trying to stop thinking about it and just stay in the moment and play the ball”.
The 30-year-old Nadal also reached the men’s doubles semi-finals with Marc Lopez and will for the first time in his career play mixed starting Wednesday.
“I don’t really measure against other players my age”, Svitolina told Sports Illustrated at the time. Although it did not work out the way she wanted to, Williams was grateful that she had made it to the Rio Olympics.
“To win a gold medal at the Olympics (would) make it so special, and if I can do it it’s just … unreal”, she said.
“Obviously I’m disappointed”, said Williams. Williams had a 4-0 record but all of that didn’t matter in Rio.
By match’s end, Svitolina had won 63 points, but merely nine came via clean winners of her own doing. She is great player and has great experience and has come back from some incredible matches. It was such a relief for me because I didn’t expect until that moment that I could win.
Playing in the Olympics, she said, “was a great opportunity”.
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In men’s competition, second seed Andy Murray raced into the last 16, blitzing Juan Monaco of Argentina 6-3, 6-1.
