WIMBLEDON, England – Serena Williams is playing at Wimbledon for the 21st time. This was Harmony Tan’s first time, but Tan will be the player heading to the second round of the All England Club.
Tan, a 115th-ranked Frenchwoman who is little known even in her home country, defeated Williams, the greatest women’s tennis champion of her era, 7-5, 1-6, 7-6 (10-7). ). Williams has not played a single game on tour since retiring in the first round of last year’s Wimbledon in tears over a thigh injury, but she had to play a lot of tennis on Tuesday night on the central court, where she won seven Wimbledon singles titles. Her exhausting duel with Tan was a stylistic contrast that lasted 3 hours and 11 minutes. What Williams was missing was the optimistic, confirming finale, and she didn’t hesitate when asked if it was okay that this was her last Wimbledon memory, if so.
“Obviously not. You know me. Definitely not,” said Williams, 40. “But today I gave everything I could do, you know, today. Maybe tomorrow I could give more. Maybe a week ago I could give more.” “But today I could do it. At some point, you have to be able to handle it. And that’s all I can do. I can’t change the weather or anything.”
She managed to change momentum on Tuesday in an open-air match for the first set and then undercover for the rest of the way, after the roof was closed to provide the stadium lighting needed to continue. Williams dominated the second set, but Tan struggled in the third until Williams’ level and energy dropped, even if her fighting spirit didn’t.
Although she saved a match point with a pass at the end of the last set and jumped to a 4-0 lead in the super tiebreak, which is new at Wimbledon this year, she could not hold back, missing too many important shots, including forehand in net at Tan’s second match point.
“I think I did pretty well physically,” Williams said. “I think the last few points I really suffered there, but I feel that it is at these key points that winning some of these points is always a mental thing that you need to have. I did pretty well with maybe one or two of them, but obviously not enough. ”
Tan’s clear balance under the pressure of the big game was remarkable for a player with so little experience who first appeared on the center court. But she said she had to fight within herself to believe she could really beat Williams.
“When I saw the draw, I was really scared because it’s Serena,” said Tan, 24. “She’s a legend and yes, I said to myself, ‘Oh God, how can I play?’ If I can win one or two games.” “It was really good for me.”
Instead, she won two sets, turning what could have been a pleasant story for Williams into a narrow defeat that would raise the question of how much more professional tennis Williams intends to play. She will turn 41 in September, and her quest for a record-breaking 24th singles Grand Slam title seems increasingly thoughtful. Longtime number 1, she is now in 1204th place and soon there will be no ranking at all. But she did not give a definite answer as to whether this was her last appearance at Wimbledon.
“This is a question I can’t answer,” she said. “I don’t know. Who knows where I’m going to jump?”
But at least he can leave the All England Club with a less painful memory than the one he took from last year’s Wimbledon when he tore a hamstring after slipping in the first set of his first-round match with Alexandra Sasnovich, limping off the center court in great suffering. She did not play competitively again until last week, when she returned to play in pairs in Eastbourne, England, with Ons Jabeur. Tuesday’s game against Tan was the first singles match for Williams in a year, and to her credit, she threw herself and raced through the peaks and valleys.
“It was definitely a long, very long battle and a battle and definitely better than last year,” Williams said.
It was a ragged but ultimately delightful performance as she tried to shake off the rust and solve the countless mysteries posed by Tan, who had been watching Williams just off to their duel. “Seeing her next to me before we went out on the court was really scary because she’s so impressive,” Tan said in French. “It was difficult, and even in the end, when we shook hands, she was still impressive.
“When I was little, I watched her so many times on TV,” she said in an interview on the court. “My first Wimbledon is wow!”
Williams’ closeness to victory was a tribute to her willpower rather than her strength, as she failed to dominate with her first serve or full rebounds and instead made her way through long rallies and compromised situations in the third set, digging low for Tan distinctly cut shots and bumping into corners. Williams served for the game at 5-4 and was two points away from winning at 30-15, only to lose the next three points and her serve when she struck an unconvincing forehand shot that Tan slipped her for a backhand winner.
Williams and her toy, full of family, friends and team members, including her new coach Eric Hechtman, could not celebrate. She battled a match ball when serving at 5-6, 30-40 with a forehand volley winner. She then had to orient herself in the tiebreak despite the fatigue in her legs and the strain in her eyes. She jumped to a 4-0 lead before Tan pulled out the next five points, keeping Williams out of balance.
Tan, coached by 1998 Wimbledon finalist Natalie Tausiat, lacks pure strength and has a second serve, but she understands the geometry of tennis and has an unconventional set of tools that is very suitable for grass. She also had a good scout record: Tausiat is 54 and has long since retired, but faced Williams three times in singles, beating her in the final of an indoor tournament in Paris in 2000 on a fast surface with a low jump. Tausiat understands how important it is to keep Williams out of her main hit zones and keep her moving.
“Thank you, Natalie,” Tan said in an interview on the court, looking at Tausiat in the player’s box.
From the beginning, Tan made Williams divination and stretching, often mixing exquisite drop shots with attacks on the net; towering lobes with backhand strikes; side slices of forehand with loop topspin.
“Any other opponent would probably be better suited to my game,” said Williams, who rarely managed to adjust to power-based duels or any particular model of play for long.
No one but Tan knew what lay ahead. Williams, who lost to such a variety of players even in her prime, often seemed confused at first. She, too, seemed as tight as a piano wire, struggling to let go of her natural strength and skipping swings and approaching group strikes as she struggled to move sideways.
This was certainly understandable in light of her long break, and the crowd reacted with awkward silence at first. The Grand Tennis Theater, where Williams has experienced so many ups and downs over the decades, was almost half empty at first, but as the match became a marathon, it was filled with support and emotion as Williams tried to avoid only the third first -round exit of her career in a Grand Slam tournament.
She failed to do so, despite all her obvious desire, and there may not be many more big tournaments ahead, although Williams did not rule out her return to the US Open, where she won her first Grand Slam title in singles in 1999. 17 years old.
“Your first time is always special,” she said, speaking slowly and quietly. “There’s definitely, you know, a lot of motivation to get better and play at home.”
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