After her difficult time around pregnancy and birth, Serena Williams is in the Wimbledon final – and reaches for her 24th Grand Slam title.
By Jörg Allmeroth from Wimbledon
Serena Williams had to stress it over and over again that Thursday night. How unlikely this is, the victories here in Wimbledon, from the first round to the end of the first week. And then once again into the final game, to the last Centre Court appointment with a familiar face on the other side of the net, with Angelique Kerber: “Nothing was taken for granted here,” said the 36-year-old American with a mild smile, “when I think about where I came from for this final, for this tournament at all, then it’s really a miracle”.
Williams loves the dramatic, the great staging, the great narrative too. But the fact that she had the chance to win her 24th Grand Slam title at these Open English Championships in 2018 – after a heavy pregnancy, a heavy birth and life-threatening weeks afterwards – is probably by far the most remarkable story of an already more than remarkable career. “If she wins this title,” tennis legend Chris Evert says, “it would eclipse everything she’s achieved so far.”
One year ago, when Spanish player Garbine Muguruza made her first success on the legendary tennis green, Williams was still pregnant. In September, daughter Olympia was born, but there were already bigger complications, finally a caesarean section was necessary. But the real time of suffering only began afterwards: Because of a pulmonary embolism Williams had to lie in hospital for weeks and was obviously in mortal danger. “It was not always clear that I would make it,” she now said in London, “but I have a strong will. I’ve been through so much in my life. I’m a tough woman.”
Now, barely ten months later, she is really and truly back in the biggest final of tennis, her tenth Wimbledon final. It is, unlike in all the years before, a sensation, a big exclamation mark, an unprecedented act of will. Especially because Williams could have said goodbye to her daughter Olympia long ago and even more so after her difficult birth, as the proud winner of all the treasures that are to be distributed in this sport. “But I love the challenges. I wanted to prove to myself that I could attack the top again as a mother,” says Williams, “but it is somewhat unreal that things are moving forward so quickly now.
Especially against Julia Görges in the semi-finals, the American already played on the level of her brilliant and glorious years, irresistible in her power and passion and precision. “It was the best game of her last comeback,” said Mother Oracene Price on Thursday, sitting in the players’ restaurant with the rest of the Williams clan, “she can still amaze me every day. She’s an incredible child.”
Officially, the younger of the two Williams sisters is still and only number 181 in the world rankings when she marches into the Theater der Tennisträume with Kerber on Saturday. She is only playing in her fourth tournament since returning to the Centre Courts and was initially disappointed, as in her first-round defeat in Miami in March. At the French Open she retired only hours before the prestige match with Maria Sharapova due to a chest muscle injury. Only in Wimbledon did she suddenly find her old strength and magic again, she looks like the boss of the shop who has to be beaten. “I’m used to having everyone playing the greatest tennis game of their lives against me. That’s why I have to be even better,” says Williams. Even now, as a mother, deep in her thirties.
In the second week of the tournament it had emerged that only Kerber would be able to stop Williams’ 24th Grand Slam title victory run – the tough German top player, who two years ago had already been courageous and self-confident in the final against the over-woman of the scene. “Kerber has the quality to absorb the merciless pressure of Serena,” says Grande Dame Martina Navratilova, the nine-time Wimbledon winner, “and she works here as if she’s on a mission. She finally wants to win Wimbledon. But Serena doesn’t like it.”