Only one day after professing herself to be the best player in the world, Serena Williams was dismissed from the Internazionali BNL d’Italia in her opening round match.
Patty Schnyder beat the second seed in three sets 6-2, 2-6, 6-1 early Wednesday morning in Italy.
The match was delayed for several hours because of inclement weather in Rome, and after it finally began, Schnyder raced to an early lead. Williams came back to dominate in the second, only to crash out in the third set.
Although there is never a good time to lose a tennis match, Serena’s loss could not have come at a worst time. Speaking yesterday to the media in Rome, Williams declared herself the best tennis player in the world, although she is ranked second on the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour rankings.
“We all know who the real No. 1 is,” Williams said. “Quite frankly, I’m the best in the world.”
Dinara Safina, the official world number one player, won her opening round match against Virginie Razzano 7-6(1), 6-1.
Aside from the fact that I really like Peppermint Patty – it’s double the fun because she beat Serena Williams AFTER Serena went about proclaiming herself as the best player in the world. I wonder what she said in her post-match presser.
It does seem appropriate that Serena would lose after saying what she said, after all what’s life without Karma. However, what did she say that was so wrong? She’s only said it so many times before, and while one can be angry that she seems “loud-mouthed” or “arrogant”, can we really say that Serena is not as good as she claims or believes herself to be? And even if she isn’t, no one else is out there giving her accolades. I don’t know what mental toughness it takes to go out there and compete such as tennis players do, but goodness knows from all the blogs I visit that there is an overwhelming amount of people who say all kinds of mean, spiteful things about Serena despite all that she’s achieved. After weeks of no tennis news from the WTA, articles pick on something that she’s said countless times before, and what’s so amazing is that people still get all in a twist when they hear it. Patty beat Serena in her first round at a tournament, so has countless others. Patty will not win this tournament, but what makes Serena so good is that she can say what she says, annoy a lot of people in saying it, gets beaten in her first round and still come back and defy all the odds. So hate or love Serena, Serena’s just going to keep being Serena.
She said she has “bad mouth” injury. Doesn’t she look stupid now? So where is this greatness exactly coming from, because she is not winning lately, and she didn’t even win most in the last 12 months. World best was Sfeffi Graff, Martina Navratilova, Justine, but they were never that arrogant! She could learn from Nadal, who being truly number 1 still honors his biggest rival and not trying to put himself above everybody else!
Its not that anyone truly doubted she’s the best player & quite unbeatable at her beastly best.
It was, just a question of being respectful – in grace and in defeat.
She’s always said that, and it would have been appropriate if the dodgy WTA computer said she was.
At this rate, she’s actually fired up one more reason for everyone else to seriously die to beat her.
Patty just made the point.
And, right on schedule, Kaia Kanepi kicked Patty Schnyder to the curb today in the third round, just a few seconds shy of an hour and in no uncertain terms (6-3, 6-0). This has indeed happened before: a really solid player with very good skills (like Patty) becomes hyper-energized for a match against a bona fide champion (like Serena), wins the match and then loses all energy and focus and determination in the next match. Total epinephrine depletion!
As for Signorina Boastful, the early loss was extremely bad timing. But Serena’s tendency to crow is quite understandable. Rightly or wrongly, you only have to look at her record to see that she really does have something to crow about.
That was the point I made Wilson and Patty proved it. As for naming the greats as Beata did, Serena has never compared herself to Navratilova or Graf, and indeed looks up to them. As for naming Justine, she might have not been arrogant, but she cheated at the french open in 2003 and could never play a match without looking at her coach a thousand times. Jankovic with all her smiles and engaging personality is forever complaining while on court (2008 US open against Serena, 2008 Stuggart against Venus, 2008 Wimbledon b/c she was placed on court 18), Sharapova’s father can’t stop getting fined for always coaching his daughter. Serena, and for that matter Venus, never claims a point she has not earned, and keeps things fair. Yeah, Serena has her faults, but so do other players, if you’re gonna call her out, call out others too.