The Wimbledon women’s final had ended anticlimactically on Saturday, and Tony Adamson, the announcer at the All England Club, intoned: “Ladies and Gentlemen. The runner-up. Venus Williams!” Even for those who had watched the match closely, those words still had an odd ring to them. Wimbledon has long been the Williams sisters’ territory, but it was Venus, not Serena, who had the biggest stake in the place.Venus had won five singles titles, including the last two. She had won 20 straight singles matches and until Sunday, 34 straight sets. But despitefew hints of regime change in the early rounds, this did not turn out to be her year. Instead, it was her younger sister Serena’s turn to keep the inscribers busy. Serena broke open this often edgy final midway through the second set and then secured her third Wimbledon singles title by breaking Venus’s serve in a tight final game to win, 7-6 (3), 6-2.
Serena’s victory on Saturday provided the latest confirmation that she is back on another historic run. At age 27, she now holds three of the four major singles titles: Wimbledon, the Australian Open and United States Open.Remarkably, she remains No. 2 in the rankings behind Dinara Safina, who has yet to win a single major. Over all, Serena has won 11 Grand Slam singles titles: the best total in her family (Venus has seven) and just one behind Billie Jean King, who stands sixth on the career list and was in the Royal Box on Saturday.
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