ELINA SVITOLINA, the young Ukraine tennis player who stunned top seed Serena Williams in the women’s singles. The Ukrainian committed just 15 unforced errors compared to 35 for Williams.
Advertisement
The Brazilian soccer great tweeted Tuesday: “I am continuing my physiotherapy and focused on joining you for the closing festivities on August 21”. But at least I was able to make it to Rio.
A four-time gold medallist, including in the singles in London, Williams was below her best against the persistent Svitolina.
Serena and sister Venus are the most successful players in Olympic tennis history with four gold medals each but Rio has been terrible for the family. She entered the night 0-4 against Williams, an owner of 22 Grand Slam singles championshp, the 2012 Olympic singles title and three Olympic doubles golds. “I think she played unbelievable”.
“I didn’t really think I could win until it was 40-30 and I finally won the match”, Svitolina said.
Williams’ defeat came hours after third seed and French Open champion Garbine Muguruza was upset by Puerto Rico’s Monica Puig. So that gives another indication of how unforeseeable Tuesday’s result was. “This is just a flawless moment”, said Svitolina, who will face Czech Republic’s Petra Kvitova in the quarter finals.
She ended the first set with an ace and a blank stare, as if this were no big deal and she knew she would do this all along. A turning point was when she missed an overhead shot into the net with a score of 2-1. Svitolina’s 6-4, 6-3 victory earned her a quarterfinal matchup with the Czech Republic’s Petra Kvitova later this week.
But Williams did not go quietly.
She was a break to the good again in the second set, nervelessly backing it up with a service hold for 3-1. At one point, she screamed out in pain, “shoulder, shoulder”.
The British No1 was crushed after losing his first-round doubles match with Jamie on Sunday but put that behind him with an emphatic win over 107th-ranked Monaco. Serena was listless from the start, dropping the first set (which isn’t rare) but then, right when she usually starts to psych herself up to begin her second-set comeback, she seemed to retreat and wave a white flag.
On Monday, Williams managed to turn things around, as she so often does.
She experienced a rare crisis of confidence at the worst possible time.
The No. 2 seed Murray dominated the world No. 107 on Tuesday and stayed on track as the favourite to win the gold following Serbian top seed Novak Djokovic’s elimination over the weekend, reports Efe.
Spanish great Rafael Nadal beat Italy’s Andreas Seppi 6-3, 6-3 to advance to the round of 16 in the Rio 2016 Olympic tennis tournament. Fifteen months ago, she played an entire French Open so sick that she could hardly stand up, yet she won.
Advertisement
Williams, who had planned her Olympic return since she triumphed in London, was left with memories but no hardware this time.
