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Smashing sister act
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The Williams sisters, Venus and Serena, have given the Bangalore Open a welcome celebrity sheen
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Photo: K. Gopinathan
Luck of the draw Venus and Serena are in the same half of the draw
The sister act left tennis buffs asking for more. When the Williams sisters – Venus and Serena – decided to play in the Canara Bank Bangalore Open Tier II tennis tournament, currently in progress at the KSLTA Courts, the buzz just got big
ger and better and in fact it even tided over the shock and awe triggered by Sania Mirza’s pull-out from the event.
However a wee bit of nerves did hover until the Williams sisters with their father Richard Williams touched down at the HAL Airport last weekend. The apprehension was not unfounded as last year, Serena after promising to turn up, gave the tournament a skip. “Last year I wanted to come but unfortunately I couldn’t and this year I am here,” Serena told the media in a packed press conference with elder sister Venus beside her. The double act however has its touch of irony as the duo are drawn in the same half of the draw which means that if they stay on course, they would end up playing each other in the semi-finals and the much-touted summit clash between the two would not happen. “Yeah I know about that. In fact I never knew she – Serena – was playing in this tournament and I think she didn’t know that I was playing here. We have different managers who do our schedules. But now that we are here, we hope to go all the way to the semi-finals and take it from there. But in doubles we are playing together and we - the Williams sisters - want to win that title,” Venus said.
While the daughters expressed their desire to finish on top of the heap in the current tournament, father Richard Williams looked beyond tennis.
“Driving to our hotel, we saw a lot of poverty. People living on sidewalks. We want to do something and I would come again to India. We are planning a project here with the State Government and with Vijay Amritraj to help. We are planning to get some aid from companies in the United States. Anyway it is much better here than the place we come from, Compton, where there are shootouts and people blow each others heads off.”
And while the Williams family drew in the flashbulbs and the microphones, the tournament is also about the little-known players struggling hard to make a mark. Sanda Mamic from Croatia may not ring a bell no matter how hard you work your grey cells but the petite player spoke with such candour and humour about a tennis career marred by injuries and surgeries, so much so that the pathos in her life was nearly overlooked.
“I lost two and a half years in tennis which is a lifetime in the sport because I had a surgery on my left hand, which is my playing hand. There was tendinitis, an inflamed nerve and a torn ligament and the surgery went for three hours. My left hand was ugly and it is tough for a girl to handle so much ugliness. In between I had a head surgery too, let’s not talk about that but I am back. It feels good, feels incredible to play and win. And I don’t want any more surgeries,” Mamic said and laughed aloud.
Bangalore too is bracing up for an acid test as the Women’s Tennis Association’s (WTA) CEO Larry Scott will soon pass verdict on the City’s eligibility to continue hosting a Tier II event. “The minimum adequate requirements have been met though an awful lot of work still needs to be done and it all depends on continued Government and Corporate support to the KSLTA,” Scott said before leaving the City after a short inspection while tournament director and KSLTA secretary Sunder Raju reiterated that his association is working on improving facilities.
Right now though all eyes are on the weekend climax when the tournament concludes and hopefully the Williams sisters would be around to do battle along with the top-seed Jelena Jankovic of Serbia and other leading players. The vagaries of sport struck here late on Tuesday night as China’s Zi Yan upset the eighth-seeded Russian Maria Kirilenko in a singles first round match. Hopefully the Williams sisters will stay on course for their singles semi-final clash and for their much-desired doubles title triumph. And as Vijay Amritraj said, “the players hopefully will take back wonderful memories of Bangalore and India
K.C. VIJAYA KUMAR
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