“Every time I step out on the court, if I don’t win, it’s major national news”, she said. I had no idea, that’s awesome, right? “I thought it was good”.
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Afterward, the six-time Wimbledon champion was asked whether she knew she had reached a milestone by getting her 300th Grand Slam match victory, breaking a tie with Chris Evert for second place behind Navratilova’s total of 306.
“Obviously I love having that Sunday off but I’m a little behind in my matches, so I guess I had to play an extra day”, Williams said.
Williams completed her own, self-described, “Serena Slam”, at Wimbledon past year but has since experienced a barren run by her standards.
After falling an early break behind at 2-1, Williams won 11 of the last 12 games and 24 of the second set’s 28 points.
Polish third seed Agnieszka Radwanska, beaten by Serena in the 2012 final, will continue her quest for a first major title against Slovakia’s Dominika Cibulkova. “I look at it nearly like something that’s really awesome to be in that position”.
Sloane Stephens and Svetlana Kuznetsova in particular were given a standing ovation on Court One after a dramatic contest which ended with the Russian winning 6-7, 6-2, 8-6 despite having conducted a running argument with the umpire, Marijana Veljovic, who accused her of receiving illegal coaching from her entourage.
Six-time women’s victor Serena Williams is paired against Svetlana Kuznetsova in the next match on Centre Court, followed by No. 2 Andy Murray against Nick Kyrgios.
Johnson won on grass at Nottingham and was a quarter-finalist at Queen’s in the Wimbledon build-up.
Tsonga, seeded No. 12, came back after dropping the first two sets to outlast No. 18 Isner 6-7 (3), 3-6, 7-6 (5), 6-2, 19-17 for Tsonga in almost 4 1/2 hours.
“Roberta’s a really tough opponent”, said Vandeweghe, who is 4-0 against top-10 players this season. “She has a lot of craftiness to her game that you don’t see too much”.
“I definitely have the tools to beat Andy, but saying that, he’s probably one of the best players in the world and he’s probably the favorite at the moment since Novak is out”, Kyrgios said. “But if I do win, it’s just like a small tag in the corner”.
The 31-year-old 13th seed battled back from 2-5 down in the final set to defeat USA 18th seed Sloane Stephens 6-7 (1/7), 6-2, 8-6.
Tennis legend Rod Laver admitted he was saddened by Novak Djokovic’s failure to break his 47-year long Grand Slam record. The 28th-seeded American served 23 aces and beat Nicolas Mahut 6-4, 7-6 (5), 6-4.
Kuznetsova has a tattoo on her arm reading “pain doesn’t kill me, I kill pain”, but the Russian’s threshold for enduring Serena’s brand of torturous power was reaching breaking point.
The All England Club put 22,000 tickets on general sale for Sunday which took just 27 minutes to sell out.
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Williams was among the millions who never imagined Djokovic would lose to Sam Querrey in Wimbledon’s third round on Saturday, even from the point of two sets behind, where they resumed after being forced off by rain on Friday.
