Serena Williams Keeps Fighting, But Falls Short in Another Grand Slam

Bianca Andreescu of Canada poses with the trophy after and with runner-up Serena Williams of the United States at Arthur Ashe Stadium at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center on September 07, 2019 in New York City. TPN—Getty Images
SEAN GREGORY September 8, 2019
At the U.S. Open, the Arthur Ashe stadium crowd never ceases to insert itself into the action. Remember, for example, a year ago, when the angry fans — still ticked by a controversial call that took a game away from Serena Williams — booed while Naomi Osaka was receiving her first Grand Slam title trophy, creating one of the most uncomfortable sports moments of this century. During the second set of the women’s final on Saturday between Serena Williams, 37, and Bianca Andreescu, 19, of Canada, the crowd suddenly erupted in cheers as Williams was flailing, in a sort of desperate attempt to rescue her.

And for awhile, the roars worked. Trailing by a set and down 1-5 — the match was for all purposes over — Serena started playing like, well, Serena. “I was just thinking, honestly at that point, Wow, this is terrible,” says Williams. “I just couldn’t go down like that.”

So Serena’s U.S. Open heartbreak continues. Four times in recent years, Williams arrived at Ashe on a seemingly inevitable march towards history. In 2015, she entered the U.S. Open having won the year’s first three Grand Slam titles, attempting to become the first player since Steffi Graf in 1988 to win the calendar year Grand Slam. Italy’s Roberta Vinci, however, shocked her in the semifinals. A year later, Williams could have broken Graf’s record of 22 Open Era Grand Slam titles in front of adoring American fans. She fell in the semis again, this time to Karolina Pliskova of the Czech Republic. (Williams broke Graf’s record in January 2017, when she beat her sister Venus Williams in the Australian Open while pregnant).


After missing the 2017 U.S. Open to give birth to her daughter Olympia, she came back to New York last year to try to tie Court’s overall record of 24 Grand Slams, but lost in the final to Osaka. With this loss to Andreescu, she’s still chasing Court.

Such recent failure doesn’t diminish Serena’s remarkable return to tennis since giving birth to her daughter in September 2017. No athlete has come back from a life-threatening labor, to return to top form in a grueling individual sport like tennis, in her late 30s no less. She’s played in four Grand Slam finals since the start of 2018. No other woman can match that mark.

Still, going winless in these finals is rankling her. She hasn’t even won set in these last four Grand Slam finals appearances. When someone asked her after the match if the losses are having less of an impact on her, Serena gave the questioner a proper side-eye. “I honestly don’t think Serena showed up,” she says.

The Ashe crowd received Andreescu warmly during the awards ceremony after the match. Thankfully, no controversy caused ugly booing in back-to-back years. Andreescu acknowledged that the pro-Serena crowd was her biggest hurdle to victory — the fans laughed — and Serena thanked the crowd for inspiring her comeback.

“I’m like so, so close, so close, so close,” says Serena. “Yet so far away.”

Culled from the TIME vault mag

So back to the question. Is there any chance Serena might be involved in match fixing or do these recurrent losses in epic finals suggest a jinx?
Please pen your thoughts....

Sister!

Is this really Serena?

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