Coach Patrick Mouratoglou suggested in a recent interview for ESPN that Serena Williams might skip the rest of the season and now the information is out that the American will indeed not play any more tournaments in 2015.
Unfortunately, @serenawilliams World No.1 @Serena Wiliams has withdrawn from the #chinaopen and @WTA finals in #Singapore.
— China Open (@ChinaOpen) October 1, 2015
Although the all-Italian US Open final was fresh and exciting, the tennis world was still reeling from Serena Williams‘ unexpected loss to Roberta Vinci. It goes without saying that the defeat shocked Serena herself, but Mouratoglou revealed just how much of a blow it dealt.
Mouratoglou, who has coached Serena since just after her first-round exit in the 2012 French Open, recently expressed that he doesn’t think it wise that the world number one participate in the year’s remaining tournaments, including the China Open and the WTA Finals, and Serena has apparently accepted his strategies.
She was two matches away from something really big, so it was very painful. Any loss is very painful for her, but this one even more than usual, so it just takes time to recover from it. When the motivation comes back, which I don’t doubt it will, then it will be time to start tournaments again.
The French coach points to mental and emotional stress from the loss rather than physical stress, as Serena is now coping with the shattered expectations of a Calendar Slam, something only one other woman has achieved. In addition to pressure from eager tennis fans and critics, Williams faced her own sky-high expectations, and now must find new ways to motivate herself in the aftermath.
I don’t doubt she will have the motivation to win more Grand Slams and reach records. I’m just thinking about the end of the season, and I don’t know how high the motivation is, and I don’t think she should go play competitions if her motivation is not high enough.
Even though Mouratoglou’s statements are all about mental readiness for competition, the official reasons stated for the withdrawal are that Serena wants to address her health and heal. (photo: @Sportnotizie24)
Weak
I have to say I don’t feel that sorry for her. She is one of the top athletes in the world, she is incredibly successful and she is hugely rich. So she didn’t win her nth grand slam and equal the record of some other similar person? Think about her sister who continues to play and do well while dealing with an ongoing illness. Think about all the people who slog away every day and sometimes win, sometimes lose, and feel really happy when they win one grand slam or just one lesser tournament. Think about the people who are too busy wondering whether they will have enough to eat to think about tennis. First world problems!
CLT, I don’t think Serena should compare herself to other, less successful players. Why should anyone lower their standards. You try to do the best you can and for Serena this Calendar Slam was so reachable, it was just two steps away, and she failed.
I’m not saying that she shouldn’t strive to do well, and to reach the limits of her capacity which is obviously higher than most people’s, but I am saying that being in severe emotional distress at this juncture is over the top and lacks perspective. It’s like when everyone was saying a couple of years ago that Roger Federer was done for because he lost a few matches and he said hey, I’m still top five, how can you say I am doing badly? And he’s still there several years later. Also I think to say that she “failed” is a negative way of looking at it. She won three grand slams this year and in the fourth one she lost to a better player on the day, which means she is human. Ok she didn’t reach that particular goal, but her life is hardly ruined. And possibly if everyone hadn’t been hyping so much about it in the first place she might not have been so stressed and she might have won.
That’s right, she’s human and considered the best by many. It’s very understandable why she’d be depressed about such a major loss. It was after all a tremendous one, as she had no foreseeable reason to lose. I felt horrible after watching her lose, so I can imagine how she felt and likely still feels. I just hope she doesn’t use her temporal state of “depression” as an excuse to get distracted and off course again, as she once did some years ago when she was pursuing a so-called acting career. She just needs to regroup and realize “so goes life.” She has a habit of saying she’s a perfectionist. Well, it’s high-time she realize nobody’s perfect. We all fail from time to time; however, most know to pick themselves up by the bootstraps and press on. As someone indicated, Serena did have an amazing year, winning 3 major titles consecutively. She still has much to offer the sport called tennis and will definitely win more majors. I’m still a fan and still regard her as currently the best in the game. However, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to distance herself from celebs such as Drake.