Serena Williams Readies Herself For Her Closeup
By Ken Miller, Lawn Tennis Correspondent, Posted: Saturday, April 5, 2008 6:00am CST USA
Serena Williams of the USA
MIAMI--(lawntennismag.com)Several years ago the American, former number one and Sony Ericsson Open defending champion Serena Williams joked
her "other job" tennis
was interfering with her acting career. That was a few years after Williams held the Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon and the
US Open singles titles all at once. Williams, who in 2002-2003 was the last player male or female to accomplish that unthinkable feat,
exploded onto the WTA Tour
as a part-time player back in 1998.
Miami, Florida, United States March 26-April 6, 2008
$3,770,000 | Hard court Day 11 Saturday | Women's Final
Ranked number 304, we first caught a glimpse at her all court aggressive game in Chicago as she upset
American Monica Seles and Mary Pierce of France, both top 10 players and grand slam champions. Williams' game early on drew obvious
comparions to her older sister Venus Williams' game. Fellow American Lindsay Davenport liked Serena's
serve better than Venus'. Williams' father and coach Richard Williams had before she'd turned pro predicted Serena would be better than Venus.
But no one could have expected that Serena would deliver the goods. Serena Williams set several youngest ever records including
winning Wimbledon at only 16 years old in the mixed doubles in 1998.
Williams this week in Miami remarked she looks better physically than she has since age one. And with her acting career possibly on
hold, Williams revealed her commitment to tennis.
"Tennis is number one in my life," Williams said. I really enjoy the game. It's a great job. It pays well."
After having won eight singles grand slam titles and four singles titles at Miami, Williams today takes on Jelena Jankovic of Serbia in the
women's Miami final. Williams leads Jankovic 3-2 head to head, but looked flat footed and displayed a game full of errors in their prior
meeting at the Australian Open quarterfinals in January of this year and lost 6-3, 6-4.
The last couple of weeks however Williams has cleaned up her game to defeat her sister Venus at Bangalore and crush world number one
Justine Henin of Belgium in a shocker 6-2, 6-0. 13-1 in match play this year, Williams will be keen to avenge her only loss of the year.
Jankovic will wait to see if Serena will gift her with errors today, but I think Serena will power herself to another closeup
with the winner's trophy.
