Serena Williams Exits Wimbledon in the First Round, Again

WIMBLEDON, England — It was the twenty first time that Serena Williams has performed Wimbledon. It was Concord Tan’s first time, however Tan would be the participant heading to the second spherical on the All England Membership.

Tan, a Frenchwoman ranked a hundred and fifteenth who’s little-known even in her nation, defeated Williams, the best girls’s tennis champion of her period, 7-5, 1-6, 7-6 (10-7). Williams had not performed a singles match on tour since retiring within the first spherical of final yr’s Wimbledon in tears with a hamstring harm, however she received to play loads of tennis on Tuesday night on the Centre Court docket the place she had gained seven Wimbledon singles titles. Her grueling duel with Tan was a stylistic distinction that lasted 3 hours and 11 minutes. What was lacking for Williams was the upbeat, reaffirming end, and she or he didn’t hesitate when requested if she was OK with this being her remaining Wimbledon reminiscence if that was the way in which it turned out.

“Clearly not. You realize me. Positively not,” Williams, 40, mentioned. “However at the moment I gave all I might do, you already know, at the moment. Perhaps tomorrow I might have gave extra. Perhaps per week in the past I might have gave extra. However at the moment was what I might do. In some unspecified time in the future you’ve to have the ability to be OK with that. And that’s all I can do. I can’t change time or something.”

She did achieve altering the momentum on Tuesday in a match that was performed below open skies for the primary set after which below cowl the remainder of the way in which after the roof was closed to offer the stadium lighting essential to proceed. Williams dominated the second set however Tan fought again within the third whereas Williams’s stage and power dipped even when her combating spirit didn’t.

Although she saved a match level on her serve late within the remaining set and jumped out to a 4-0 lead within the tremendous tiebreaker, which is new at Wimbledon this yr, she couldn’t maintain on, lacking too many essential photographs, together with a forehand into the online on Tan’s second match level.

“I feel bodily I did fairly good,” Williams mentioned. “I feel the final couple factors, I used to be actually struggling there, however I really feel like in simply these key factors, profitable a few of these factors, is at all times one thing mentally that it’s important to have, that you simply sort of want. I did fairly good on perhaps one or two of them, however clearly not sufficient.”

Tan’s clear-thinking poise below big-match strain was exceptional for a participant with so little expertise and who was making her first look on Centre Court docket. However she mentioned she needed to battle inside herself to consider that she actually might defeat Williams.

“Once I noticed the draw I used to be actually scared, as a result of it’s Serena,” mentioned Tan, 24. “She’s a legend, and yeah, I used to be like, ‘Oh my God, how can I play?’ If I can win one or two video games, it was actually good for me.”

She gained two units as a substitute, turning what might have been a feel-good story for Williams right into a slim defeat that may repose the query of how way more skilled tennis Williams intends to play. She is going to flip 41 in September, and her quest for a record-tying twenty fourth Grand Slam singles title appears more and more far-fetched. A longtime No. 1, she is now ranked 1,204th and can quickly don’t have any rating in any respect. However she offered no definitive reply as to if this was her remaining Wimbledon look.

“That’s a query I can’t reply,” she mentioned. “I don’t know. Who is aware of the place I’ll pop up?”

However no less than she will be able to go away the All England Membership with a much less painful reminiscence than what she took from final yr’s Wimbledon, when she tore a hamstring after slipping within the first set of her first-round match with Aliaksandra Sasnovich, hobbling off Centre Court docket in nice misery. She didn’t play competitively once more till final week when she returned to play doubles in Eastbourne, England, with Ons Jabeur. Tuesday’s match in opposition to Tan was Williams’s first singles match in a yr, and to her credit score, she scrapped and hustled by the peaks and valleys.

“It was positively lengthy, a really lengthy battle and battle and positively higher than final yr,” Williams mentioned.

It was a ragged however in the end admirable efficiency as she tried to shake off the rust and resolve the myriad riddles posed by Tan, who had watched Williams solely from afar till their duel. “Seeing her subsequent to me earlier than we walked out on court docket was actually intimidating, as a result of she’s so imposing,” Tan mentioned in French. “It was tough and even on the finish, after we shook palms, she was nonetheless imposing.”

“Once I was younger I used to be watching her so many occasions on the TV,” she mentioned in her on-court interview. “My first Wimbledon is wow!”

That Williams got here near victory was extra a tribute to her willpower than her energy as she did not dominate together with her first serve or full-cut returns and as a substitute battled her method by prolonged rallies and compromised conditions within the third set, digging low for Tan’s crisply sliced photographs and hustling into the corners. Williams served for the match at 5-4 and was two factors from victory at 30-15 solely to lose the subsequent three factors and her serve when she hit an unconvincing forehand method shot that Tan slapped previous her for a backhand winner.

Williams and her participant field filled with household, mates and group members, together with her new coach Eric Hechtman, weren’t capable of have fun. She fought off a match level when serving at 5-6, 30-40 with a forehand volley winner. She then needed to navigate the tiebreaker regardless of the weariness in her legs and the strain in her gaze. She jumped out to a 4-0 lead earlier than Tan reeled off the subsequent 5 factors by protecting Williams off steadiness.

Tan, coached by the 1998 Wimbledon finalist Nathalie Tauziat, lacks pure energy and has a puffball second serve, however she understands tennis geometry and has an unconventional software set that’s effectively suited to grass. She additionally had a very good scouting report: Tauziat is 54 and lengthy retired however she confronted Williams thrice in singles, defeating her within the remaining of an indoor event in Paris in 2000 on a quick, low-bouncing floor. Tauziat understood the significance of protecting Williams out of her prime hitting zones and of protecting her on the transfer.

“Thanks, Nathalie,” Tan mentioned in her on-court interview, trying towards Tauziat within the participant field.

From the beginning, Tan had Williams guessing and stretching, mixing often-exquisite drop photographs with forays to the online; towering lobs with counterpunched backhand passing photographs; sideswiping forehand slices with looped topspin.

“Some other opponent in all probability would have suited my recreation higher,” mentioned Williams, who was hardly ever capable of settle into power-baseline duels or any specific sample of play for lengthy.

Nobody however Tan knew what was coming. Williams, who has misplaced to such variety-loving gamers even in her prime, usually regarded befuddled within the early going. She additionally regarded as tight as piano wire, struggling to let her pure energy circulation and lacking swing volleys and method photographs by the bunch whereas laboring to maneuver laterally.

That was actually comprehensible in mild of her lengthy layoff, and the group reacted with awkward silence at first. The grand tennis theater the place Williams has skilled so many highs and some lows by the many years was almost half empty firstly however because the match became a marathon, it was crammed with assist and emotion as Williams tried to keep away from solely the third first-round exit of her profession in a Grand Slam event.

She couldn’t fairly handle it, regardless of all her evident need, and there will not be many extra main tournaments to return, though Williams didn’t rule out a return to the U.S. Open, the place she gained her first Grand Slam singles title in 1999 at age 17.

“Your first time is at all times particular,” she mentioned, talking slowly and softly. “There’s positively, you already know, a lot of motivation to get higher and to play at residence.”