Venus Wiliams has risen back into the winner’s circle, winning her first Premier title since her diagnose of sjoegren’s disease in 2011. Fans will be eager to see just how much further she can rise on the back of the win.
Venus Williams has won the Dubai Duty Free Championships, her first title since the Luxembourg Open in 2012, beating Alize Cornet 6-0, 6-3.
Williams won the title beating quality opposition in Vesnina, Ivanovic, Pennetta, Wozniacki and Cornet, the latter being in the form of her career after defeating Venus’s sister Serena in straights in the semi-final.
Venus was back to her best in the final, coming back from a break down in the first set to take it 6-3 before taking the second set to love, winning the title in 90 minutes. It was a fitting end to a week in which she did not drop a set and lost only 24 games.
After not reaching a final at all in 2013, Venus has made 2 finals now in ’14, losing to Ivanovic in three sets in the Auckland final at the start of the season. She then lost to Makarova in 3 in Melbourne, despite leading by a set and a break, and then lost to Kvitova in Dubia in a third set breaker, this time after holding match points.
Losing matches she could have won has been a defining feature of Venus’s game since coming back from sjoegren’s syndrome, a debilitating disease that took her out of the game for most of ’11, a year she played only 4 tournaments, 3 of them slams.
In 2012, she came back to a full schedule in Miami after adopting a vegan diet to counteract the energy sapping disease. It worked. She made the quarters there, repeating that feat in Rome and then reaching the semis in Canada and winning the Luxembourg title. And while her results were less stellar in 2013, she still made 3 semi-finals.
But it has been at the Majors where her game has not been able to get into full stride. In 2012, she had unlucky draws against Agnieszka Radwanska at Roland Garros and Kerber in New York, a match she lost in a final set breaker.
Such close losses characterised her campaigns at the 2013 slams she played (she missed Wimbledon with a back inury). Urszula Radwanska beat her 6-4 in the third in Paris while Jie Zheng edged her in a third set breaker in the second round of New York.
These close defeats showcased her desire to still compete for the game’s greatest prizes. Prizes she has a cabinet full of, with 7 Major titles- 5 Wimbledons and 2 US Opens.
And she could win more if her body can hold out and her win in Dubai shows it can. And in a game where age is not a factor with players in their 30s like Serena and Li Na thriving in tennis, with the right schedule, Venus’s experience and athleticism could see her hold aloft another Major trophy at the age of 33.
It would be a popular win. After all how inspiring would it be to see Venus not just defeating her tennis opponents but of also getting the better of what threatened to be a career ending disease.
Venus has shown she was anything but done before. After injuries in 2003 hurt her efforts to win a Major and tennis pundits considered the former world number one washed up, she won the 2005 Wimbledon trophy as the 14th seed.
The tennis world now waits to see if she can rise again.
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