Angelique Kerber of Germany returns to Venus Williams of the U.S during their women’s singles match on day eleven of the Wimbledon Tennis Championships in London, Thursday, July 7, 2016.
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Kerber’s win over Serena in Melbourne kept the American one win behind Steffi Graf’s open era record of 22 grand slams and she will try to do the same in Saturday’s final.
The 21-time Grand Slam champion Serena Williams has once again demanded equal pay across the sport. Serena will then play in her ninth Wimbledon final on Saturday.
The Russian held serve twice in the opening set, prompting sympathetic applause, but the world No. 50 was swept aside in the second set, winning only five points, as Serena marched to singles victory No. 85 at the All England Club.
But Kerber had no intention of being a footnote in Wimbledon history and she saw off five-time champion Venus in 71 minutes on Centre Court to reach her first All England Club title match.
Five-time champion Venus fell out of the world’s top 100 in 2011 after being diagnosed with the immune system disorder Sjogren’s syndrome..
But Serena’s coach, Patrick Mouratoglou, believes they have found the answer to losing in Grand Slam finals and the quest to equal Graf’s record.
“We are giving everything on court, everybody”. I don’t think that it’s the right topic to speak about that. It was inspiring afterwards to realise there’s a lot of things that I need to improve on. I think (sister) Venus is actually pushing me, and we’re on the tennis court. But unlike past year, when she won all three, she has not been able to add to her major title collection so far this season.
Pow. You keep on slaying, Serena.
Vesnina was equally adamant that she and her fellow women players deserve equal rewards. Between the mistakes of her opponent and her powerful serve, Williams was not struggling at all as she held to love for the second time in a row.
She never gave Vesnina a chance to pull off the sort of semifinal stunner that Vinci managed last year in NY, when she stopped Williams from completing the first calendar-year Grand Slam since Graf did it in 1988.
The trend relented when Williams framed the ball out of court on Kerber’s second game point in the sixth, to slide 4-2 adrift.
“It’s a completely new tournament”, Kerber said. “She made little to no unforced errors”.
Kerber said she’s realising a lifelong goal.
“It was a real disappointment for Venus after playing so well and such a remarkable story by coming back at the age of 36”.
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“I prefer the words “one of the greatest athletes of all time”.
