The tennis match was over almost before it had begun, and this time, Serena Williams was on the receiving end of the domination, experiencing the most lopsided loss of her career.
For the first time, Williams managed to win only one game in a professional match, holding serve in thefirst set and then being bulldozed by Johanna Konta, 6-1, 6-0, Tuesday night in the first round of the Silicon Valley Classic in San Jose, California. Williams' loss eclipsed a 6-0, 6-2 drubbing she suffered at the hands of Simona Halep in the 2014 WTA finals in Singapore. Konta is 48th in the world, according to the WTA rankings.
"I know I can play a zillion times better so that kind of helps out, too. I have so many things on my mind I don't have time to be shocked about a loss that clearly wasn't at my best right now," Williams said, via The Associated Press. "When I was out there, [I] was fighting. That's the only thing I can say. I wasn't just like giving it away and I was moving a lot better. So I'm just trying to take the positives out of it."
Despite a run to the finals at Wimbledon, Williams - 26th in the WTA rankings - has struggled at times during her return to competitive tennis to reach her typical level of play. She gave birth to her first child by Caesarean section last September and subsequently dealt with a litany of health issues, including a pulmonary embolism.
"It's difficult, I guess," she said Tuesday, speaking of her inability to regain her consistency and dominance. She then amended that comment: "Not, 'I guess.' For sure."
Despite her 6-3, 6-3 loss to Angelique Kerber in the Wimbledon final, Williams appeared to gain some confidence in her game during that tournament, saying before the final, "This is not inevitable for me" after a 13-month absence from the tour. Williams, who has worn compression shorts under her dress because of her history of blood clots, tearfully said after that loss that her mindset had changed, and that she was now playing for "all the moms out there."
What will the U.S. Open, the last Grand Slam event of the year, bring?
"I didn't know a couple of months ago where I was, where I would be, how I would do, how I would be able to come back," she said after the Wimbledon loss, which came a little over a month after she withdrew from the French Open with a pectoral injury. "It was such a long way to see light at the end of the road, kind of. So I think these two weeks have really showed me that, OK, I can compete."
