Serena Williams practices earlier than the beginning of the U.S. Open at USTA Billie Jean King Nationwide Tennis Middle on Aug. 25 in New York Metropolis.
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Serena Williams practices earlier than the beginning of the U.S. Open at USTA Billie Jean King Nationwide Tennis Middle on Aug. 25 in New York Metropolis.
Elsa/Getty Pictures
Serena Williams takes the courtroom Monday evening for her first match of what is anticipated to be her final U.S. Open.
Williams will face Danka Kovinic on the Arthur Ashe Stadium in Flushing Meadows in New York Metropolis — the location of Williams’ first U.S. Open win in 1999, when she was 17.
Earlier this month, Williams, now 40, introduced her plans to retire from tennis, after a decades-long profession through which she dominated and remodeled the ladies’s recreation and that features 23 Grand Slam singles titles.
“Along with her highly effective serve and return of serve and athleticism, she actually set that normal within the girls’s recreation,” NPR’s Tom Goldman instructed Morning Version.
“Her story of the early years in Compton, California, with sister Venus, below the tutelage of their dad, ‘King Richard,’ now of film fame, that each one grew to become a part of her legend and paved the way in which for extra younger individuals of colour to pursue what had historically been a white sport,” Goldman mentioned. “And he or she introduced extra individuals of colour into the stands to look at as nicely.”
As she ready to take the courtroom Monday, Williams obtained tributes from fellow athletes and followers, together with a spot on the cowl of Time journal.
Williams has received six U.S. Open singles championships, the final in 2014. On paper, she is the overwhelming favourite on Monday evening, with a 20-0 report in U.S. Open first-round matches — with out dropping a set since 2001, in response to the U.S. Open.
However Williams is at the moment ranked 605th for singles, returning to play solely not too long ago after battling accidents. Her opponent, 27-year-old Kovinic of Montenegro, is ranked eightieth.
Williams has solely performed 4 matches this yr, and solely received one, sports activities commentator Howard Bryant of Meadowlark Media instructed Weekend Version.
“She actually is, in all probability for the primary time in her life, an underdog” to win the U.S. Open, Bryant mentioned. “However boy, what a magical fairy story story if she will be able to come to New York and pull off some magic.”
After she retires from tennis, Williams will proceed her pioneering methods and concentrate on creating a enterprise capital agency she fashioned eight years in the past.
