At least one person has publicly shared her doubts on tennis champion Serena Williams' rather shaky performance during a doubles match with her sister Venus at this year's Wimbledon.
On Tuesday afternoon, Wimbledon fans were shocked at the mighty Serena fumbling some of the most basic tennis skills during a doubles match with Venus against Kristina Barrois and Stefanie Voegele, ESPN said. Serena made four double faults and appeared unsteady on her feet. The match umpire had to come down from his chair when he also noticed Serena's difficulty with bouncing, tossing and serving the ball. Serena tried to play one more point, but had given up and walked back to her side. An announcement was made confirming the Williams sisters' default.
Nine-time Wimbledon singles champion and Tennis Channel analyst Martina Navratilova shared her thoughts to an ESPN panel and said, "I've never seen anything like it and hopefully never will again. Everybody was put in such a difficult position, including the WTA. It's not right. It defies logic on so many fronts. The coach said he hadn't seen her for two days. He didn't know anything. How can you be a coach and not know anything? That's wrong. And Venus was just kind of there. You don't know what's going on, but virus was not it, that much is clear."
Patrick Mouratoglou, Williams' coach, had disclosed to reporters that he has not seen the tennis champ in two days. ESPN noted that two days ago, Serena, who is a five-time singles champion at Wimbledon, lost in an upset match against No. 25 Alize Cornet. Pundits believed that Williams might have taken the loss seriously.
On the other hand, Former number 1 Navratilova agreed that it might have been the case but Serena nonetheless should have taken the loss in form.
"[But] why would it take two days? Either you go home or default. I would expect a default before you play. But once you step onto the court, you're a professional tennis player, you've got to be ready to play. No matter what is ailing you or no matter if you did anything to get you in that state or you're sick or whatever, you don't step on the court. You don't step on the court no matter what," she said.
Under the United States Tennis Association (USTA) rules, a player can be defaulted in the game if he or she has committed a rule violation not limited to violent behavior, unsportsmanlike conduct or the intentional delay of the match. A walkover, on the other hand, is called before a match begins and is issued when the player is injured, ill or decides to withdraw for a personal reason.
