(courtesy ESPN.com/AP)
Serena Williams wants to be number 1 in the world again.
After years of going through the motions and some surprising losses, Serena has clearly rededicated herself to the sport. To be sure, her accomplishments are already Hall of Fame-worthy. She has the most grand slam wins of any other active player (9), has won more then $19 million on court, and is a household name in most industrialized nations.
But since her self-named “Serena Slam” where she held all four majors simultaneously from 2002-2003, she has struggled with consistency. After her 6-4, 3-6, 6-3 win over Vera Zvonareva in Charleston today, Serena has claimed three titles in a row and will climb to number 6 in the WTA Tour rankings. However, it’s a long way to go to number 1. In her favor is that fact that none of the women ahead of her, Henin, Ivanovic, Jankovic, Kuznetsova, and Sharapova, have their best games ahead of them in the coming months.
Though clay is her backyard, Henin is on the downward slide (expect her to lose number 1 by the end of the clay season). As far as the Serbs, Ivanovic has many points to defend and it shouldn’t be surprising if she falters under the pressure; Jankovic doesn’t have enough weapons to climb any higher than her current position (and I anticipate that her constant playing week in week out is going to eventually sideline her with injuries – I don’t care how flexible she is!). Svetlana does not excel on clay; neither does Maria Sharapova, though she should be commended for grinding out her first-clay court victory at Amelia Island last week.
Aranzazu Sanchez-Vicario commented before today’s final on ESPN2 that Serena lacks the relentless intensity that she had when she was utterly dominating in the early part of this decade. Can she get it back? I think so.
Serena’s course is highly reminiscent of the ups and downs that Andre Agassi has had in his career. His ranking had dropped so low at one point that he was playing challenger tournaments in the mid-90s. But, he turned his fortunes around, and after a four year dry spell in the majors between his title at the 1995 Australian, he came back in a big way and won two Slams in 1999. He won three more Aussie Opens after that.
Serena never went away for that long. When she decides to play, she is head and shoulders above the rest. Her wins at the 2005 and 2007 AOs were jawdropping performances, but she has proven that sustaining that level throughout the rest of the year was too much of a commitment.
2008 is a perfect year for her to launch this campaign to return to the top of the rankings. It’s a refreshing change from the standard line of most great players who, at a certain point in their careers, say that they play only to win the Slams (think Pete Sampras in his twilight years on the tour). Serena is aiming to confirm on the computer what the rest of the world knows when we see her play: that she is best female tennis player on the planet.
