Black Tennis Pros

A Few short seasons ago there was a fashion in tennis for saying that the era of Venus and Serena Williams was over. There was no way back for them. The two of them were no longer sufficiently focused on tennis to give it the application required of champions, so the doomsayers had it.

In fact, if you listen hard enough, no doubt you will find somebody saying it right now. But they are dangerous words, as the Williams sisters never tire of proving. Dismiss them at your peril.

Venus has four Wimbledon titles to prove the point, including the crown which makes her the reigning champion. Twelve months ago she was rated the number 23 seed on the SW19 lawns and her early form made even that look a tad generous.

It was widely forecast that the 2007 champion must come from the quarter-final between her sister Serena and Justine Henin, but everyone was looking the wrong way.

The key match was Venus’ last 16 encounter against Maria Sharapova. Sharapova was the world number two at the time, with the American ranked 30 places below her (the Wimbledon seeding committee elevated her to 23 taking into consideration her three previous title wins — rightly, it turned out). When Williams blew away Sharapova, it set her on her way to ultimate victory.

She became the lowest ranked player and lowest seed to lift the Venus Rosewater Dish, neatly breaking the record she herself had set two years previously when she won as the number 14 seed.

In case anyone thought that a fourth Wimbledon title might not be all that thrilling for her, Williams was keen to set the record straight.

“It’s wonderful,” she grinned. “You don’t expect to win Wimbledon. This is quite obviously a great surface for me. I think I know how to play on it. I know when to play it high or low, I know how the ball’s going to bounce. If there’s a surface and a place for me to pick, grass at Wimbledon is not a bad choice.

“That was my sixth Slam and I want some more! My main goal is to stay fit. When Serena and I are fit, it gives us time to prepare. Serena needs even less time to prepare than me. As long as we’re fit, we have so much to give on court.”

It’s true. They always seem to produce the most when observers expect the least. It was only last year that Serena went into the Australian Open ranked the world number 81. Nonetheless she stormed to the title, her eighth career Grand Slam victory, wiping out Sharapova in the final.

“I always go in positive, thinking: ‘I’m going to win, I’m going to win’,” explained Serena. “I’m insatiable. It’s a fair assessment that the match is essentially won or lost depending on what I do. If I’m playing my game and staying relaxed, then it’s hard for anyone against me. Doesn’t matter who they are, or what they’re ranked. It’s tough for them to beat me.

“I still have a lot of goals. There are times when you think: ‘Am I ever going to be looking at another trophy?’ But Venus and I always believe in ourselves – and it works.”

At the respective ages of 28 and 26, Venus and Serena will come into Wimbledon this year ranked six and seven in the world. Both have had injury niggles and variable form in the first half of this year, but quite often that is a sign that one or the other of them is about to produce something extraordinary. Who knows what will happen at Wimbledon 2008?

In the first match of his grass court season, the second seed put on a good performance. After making a few experiments in the first couple of games, he was done testing at 3-3. He upped tempo and put Phau under pressure. It was too much pressure for the German. After gaining the first break of the match to go up 4-3, Blake controlled the remainder of the one-sided issue almost at will. “I did indeed try a few things because I had never played against Bjoern,” the American said afterwards.

While Phau was desperate to get his serve going (“I hit only 35 percent of my first serves, that is deadly on grass”), Blake fired a string of aces. “This was one of my best service performances of all year,” he said. Blake never looked back, breaking Phau in the third game of the second set before finishing the German off after 49 minutes.

Blake is confident to make something happen in Halle this time out. “I am stronger than last year but you have to improve because the whole tour has gotten much stronger,” he added. The 28-year-old looks to further improve his serve even tough it already is one of his strengths. “I am no Andy Roddick yet,” he said. As for Wimbledon, he has high goals. “I want to finally get into the second week.”

After a very brief hiatus, the Coaches Corner will return tomorrow with an exclusive interview of the first Black female head coach at Harvard, Traci Green.

What a pleasure it was to speak with her and get a personal perspective directly from her.

Also, the Coaches Corner has received a little press recently, check it out:

SouthtownStar

Round 1 - Singles

James Blake, USA and Bjorn Pau, GER




Round 1 - Doubles

Jeff Coetzee, RSA and Wesley Moodie, RSA
vs.
Bye




Round 1 - Singles

Milagros Sequera, VEN vs. Virginia Ruano Pascual, ESP


Round 1 - Doubles

Raquel Kops-Jones, USA and Natalie Grandin, RSA
vs.
Bethanie Mattek, USA and Sania Mirza, IND


Eliminated in singles qualifying rounds:

Raquel Kops-Jones



Round 1 - Singles

Phillip Simmonds, USA vs. Jose Statham, NZL

Marcus Fugate, USA vs. Michael Yani, USA


Round 1 - Doubles

Phillip Simmonds, USA and Scott Oudsema, USA
vs.
Strahinja Bobusic, AUS and Greg Jones, AUS

Marcus Fugate, USA and Justin O'Neal, USA
vs.
G.D. Jones, NZL and Daniel King Turner, NZL



Round 1 - Doubles

Tiya Rolle, USA and Whitney Jones, USA
vs.
Romana Tedjakusuma, INA and Story Tweedie-Yates, USA

To most people, Venus Williams is the Amazonian tennis player, who has won Wimbledon four times, with a whomping serve and muscle-bound limbs that go on for ever. Yet, as a new book of photographs shows, she also has an astonishing elegance and beauty.

The book, Venus Williams, is a collaboration between the tennis player and South African-born photographer Koto Bolofo. The two first met four years ago when he spotted her walking down the street in London.

“I turned a corner in Covent Garden and there was this tall, beautiful black woman,” remembers Bolofo, “and I thought, ‘I fancy her!’ I’d never seen such a graceful woman. She was wearing a bright fluorescent pink raincoat and stood out like a sore thumb.” Bolofo contacted her agent, suggesting the project. He had wanted to photograph her ever since he watched her win Wimbledon on the TV. “There was such a strength of woman in her,” he says. “I had never seen anyone like this. She was like a gazelle, so pure. But I wanted to photograph her my way – not as a sports star with lots of muscles, but as a woman.”

“He wanted to work with me, a lowly tennis player!” is Williams’s self-mocking take on the matter. “He saw something in me that no one else has ever seen, the side that’s classic tennis player, with elegance and grace.”

The two became friends and did a few magazine shoots together, including one for Italian Vogue. But Bolofo wanted more: he wanted to do a book. He had “a vision”, Williams says, of doing a chronicle of her life.

Over the next three years, while Williams, now 27, toured the world, Bolofo tailed her, popping up in London, Istanbul, Paris and New York with photographic suggestions, a small team of helpers and a rack of clothes. He took inspiration from the Jacques Henri Lartigue photographs of junior tennis champion Suzanne Lenglen in 1915: the shot of Williams dancing round the court in a ball dress was one of the first they collaborated on. “Lartigue captured that sense of social class with a spontaneity and energy,” says Bolofo. “That was the foundation of the book.”

I'm usually a bit let down after my guy is defeated in a tournament. However, "La Monf" has put forth such a galliant effort in this tournament that his loss was not very painful on Friday.

Although Gael was not able to prevail against world no. 1 Roger Federer, he got the job done just the same. Gael injected some much need hype into the second half of Roland Garros this year and gave us some very unexpected excitement.

Federer defeated Gael 6-2, 5-7, 6-3, 7-5.

It is definitely worth mentioning that the Frenchman had some ocular issues.

"This morning I already had a pain in my eye and I think I broke my contact lens," said Monfils following his defeat.

"I couldn't see well, so I tried to put some eye drops in at the beginning of the match. Then it didn't work, so I asked the doctor to come on the court. That didn't work.

"I think part of my contact lens stayed, remained in my eye. I managed to take the other part out, but there was one part left."

"I am not trying to find any excuses, but it didn't help," said the 59th-ranked Monfils. "Each time I was trying to serve it was annoying me."

It's all good Gael, we're just glad to see you in this very positive finish. Keep it up!

I spotted this on Serena's official site today, you've just gotta love it! Too cute.