Williams, winning her 28th straight Grand Slam match, is now just one major title behind Graf on the Open era list and two behind all-time leader Margaret Court Smith.
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But Williams cranked into gear and started to find her range, forcing Muguruza to save two break points in the sixth game before she got her reward on the Spaniard’s serve to level at 4-4. She will have the opportunity to make it a clean sweep, however, come the USA open, and make it a complete calendar grand slam – something only three other women in tennis have achieved.
“She will be a legend in the future, when people look back in 20 years’ time they’ll see her as being one of the legends of the game”, said Lee Allen, 37, a biochemist from Reading, England, who watched the match on the big screen.
“Oh, my gosh, I think she’s such a great player“, she said with a smile.
Past year at Wimbledon after exiting to Alize Cornet, Serena Williams uttered: “I know I can do better”. Ive had a couple injuries.
Williams equalled fellow American Chris Evert’s 18 grand slam titles by claiming her third-straight US Open triumph previous year.
It’s Williams’ second self-styled “Serena Slam” of four majors in a row; she also did it in 2002-03.
Chris Evert watched the win and reflected on the context – comparing eras is always hard, and she made history with three Wimbledon titles among her 18 Grand Slam singles championships.
Meanwhile, Martina Hingis landed her first Wimbledon title since 1998 as she and Sania Mirza beat Ekaterina Makarova and Elena Vesnina in the women’s doubles final.
“I really don’t feel like I have anything to lose”.
“It’s been such a pleasure to have played in front of this crowd for so long”.
“I’m playing really good”.
There was no way back for Muguruza, Spain’s first female grand slam finalist in 15 years.
As she carefully descended the steps into the locker room, Williams admitted she could not stop her attention starting to shift towards that pivotal US Open battle. When she takes the court in Flushing this September, I’m guessing all eyes will be on her and history.
“I just didn’t feel my serve today”.
“I don’t think I was playing bad”.
In fact, the secret to her current stranglehold on the women’s game, might just be that she has been there, done it and bought the T-shirt.
Mouratoglou branded Williams accomplishing the “Serena Slam” an “incredible achievement”, and said nobody in the women’s game has worked out a way to consistently challenge her.
“I just never dreamt I would be out here still”, Williams said, “let alone winning”. The last major match she lost was to Alize Cornet at the 2014 Wimbledon. Serena is not going to go quietly: not in a match, not this year, and not in her career. I don’t know. She’s world No. 1. But at 2-4 Williams overturned the deficit with a stream of aces and ground-stroke winners, enabling her to take the next four games. “I was like, ‘What can I do?'” Muguruza said.
The recovery was not to last: Muguruza’s resolve then finally cracked, Williams breaking to love and converting her second Championship point.
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“Don’t be sad”, Williams said to Muguruza on court after the match. “Because I saw it”.
