Alize Cornet shows the exit door to Serena Williams

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Wilson Blade 9

Alize Cornet

Seed No.25 Alize Cornet recorded the biggest surprise of Wimbledon so far by ousting five-time champion Serena Williams 1-6 6-3 6-4 in the third round. Actually, this is Cornet’s second straight victory over the world No.1 Williams, having also beaten her in the semifinals of Dubai earlier this year.

Cornet broke Serena in the first game of the match and that was all we got from the Frenchwoman in the first set, as Serena looked on her way to another routine victory. But we got a completely different story in the second set. Cornet established a 5-0 lead and a comeback effort by Williams was not strong enough, as the American approached with three straight games, but didn’t pull off an absolute revival. In the decider, Cornet made a crucial break in the fifth game to lead 3-2 and confirmed it with a hold for 4-2. That’s when things started looking grim for the favorite Serena, but not really grim, as no deficit is too big for her. But when Cornet broke yet again to lead 5-2 the situation was alarming for the great Serena and even though she didn’t let her opponent serve it out in the following game, the next time Cornet served it was the end of Serena.

The 24th-ranked Cornet is now in the fourth round of a Grand Slam only for the second time in her career, after the 2009 Australian Open. Her next opponent will be seed No.13 Eugenie Bouchard, who defeated seed No.20 Andrea Petkovic 6-3 6-4. (photo: Jimmie48)

7 COMMENTS

  1. very disappointing to see serena go i wanted to see serena vs bouchard and then match vs maria very badly.. 🙁 she was playing so good after rain delay and all of a sudden went downhill like some one pressed off switch. it was also disappointing to see vera go only thing that will cheer me up now would be ana winning. Adje ana 😀

  2. @sru: Condolences for all those painful disappointments of yours. But, by the way, have you anything to say about anyone else, beside yourself (including your alter-ego’s, such as the lamented “serena” and “vera”)? Like, you know: “Well done Zarina, and (especially) Alizé, for beating those huge over-dogs!” Have you?
    P.S. “Adje ana” should be “Ajde Ana”. Ever heard of the idiom “The devil is in the detail”? If not, find out, I suppose you have a browser, like Google and such,
    P.P.S. I myself also root for Ana, but for, obviously, different reasons. One of them could be caring about the “details”, you see.
    P.P.P.S. May you learn to actually love (women’s) tennis and, above all, persons involved. Cheers.

  3. @Tulp oh wow… thanks for your condolences mate!! 🙂 Actually i misspelled “Ajde’ ( i know how it is spelled i just typed it wrong ) thanks for letting me know 🙂 I didn’t mean to disrespect or downgrade Alize’s huge win over serena yes she continued to play aggressive and did what she had to do in that situation but we cannot ignore the fact serena was not playing at her best. Alize was just better at the end of the day and So is Zarina i suppose . Just because i didn’t mention it in my comment doesn’t mean that i didn’t mean it . I root for Ana because i have always liked her and her tennis and i want to see her do well again which is good for her and women’s tennis(sport) in general ( so are all the matches i mentioned earlier) As far as my comments are concerned, they are my opinions and I’m sorry if it offended in you in some way
    As far as “me commenting about myself”, ” my alter-ego’s “( which i don’t get) , ” me not loving women’s tennis and persons involved( if i didn’t, i wouldn’t be on WTB i’d be on one of the player’s fan pages), are concerned, i don’t know you personally or i don’t know which situation you are in when you wrote this comment so i leave it to your ‘ability to judge people by reading their few comments online’ talent . Cheers!!

  4. Serena was in a strange place for this tournament.

    She began with a routine pre-tournament press conference where she appeared very sullen and miserable and answered most questions with single word answers.

    I heard somewhere she’d finished the relationship with the French guy – was that on her mind? Anyway her first couple of matches were won, but her ground-strokes seemed slower than normal, as was the serve.

    In the defeat to Aliza Cornet, she seemed in a weird sad place, hitting only three aces and generally appearing half engaged with the match after taking the first set 6-1. Is she carrying an injury perhaps?

    Maybe the real answer to Serena’s problems might be the realisation that she’s 32 now, and can no longer parachute into events with minimal playing and fitness preparation. I expect to see her at the pre-Wimbledon Eastbourne tournament next year, looking fitter and aiming to get some grass court playing hours in before Wimbledon.

  5. roGER, for a long time Serena has had occasional shocking losses, I don’t think we should give her any special diagnosis, it just happened, afterall, nobody can win all the time. Hmm I didn’t hear the rumors that she split with Patrick.

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