|
WIMBLEDON, DAY 9, WOMEN'S SEMIFINALS PREVIEW
It's the Belgians versus the sisters
By Matthew Cronin
tennisreporters.net
FROM WIMBLEDON – Because the Williams sisters own three Wimbledon titles and the tournament is played on the fastest outdoor surface on the planet, most bookmakers and analysts assume that Serena and Venus Williams are a virtual lock to meet in the final.
But don't tell that to Belgians Kim Clijsters and Justine Henin-Hardenne, who don't think that their meeting in the Roland Garros final three-and-a-half weeks ago was a fluke of surface. Without question the Williamses are most vulnerable on clay, but Killer Kim and Jumping Justine are fiery fireballers who can run with sisters, slug with the sisters and trade staredowns with the sisters.
Justine will go head-to-head with Serena and Kim will take on Venus in the semis Thursday.
Clijsters wants to show Venus that she's stepped up a notch and that when Venus retired against her in the '02 Home Depot semis, Clijsters was well on her way to victory. Henin-Hardenne knows that, if she rings up three straight wins against Serena, she could arguably called the game's best player at the moment.
"For Kim and it's going to be difficult," Henin-Hardenne said. "Venus is serving well and Kim had some problems today, but I think she's going to be all right on Thursday. We'll try and give it 100 percent.
Serena is going to play well because she's going to be very motivated, but I'm pretty excited too."
JUSTINE/SERENA
Fred Mullane/Camerawork USA, Inc. |
Henin-Hardenne just took out Serena is the most emotional contest of the year in the semifinals of Paris and Clijsters is two wins away from grabbing the No. 1 ranking. Henin wants to prove that her win over Serena was not a dirtballers' special and that she was more responsible for Serena's defeat than the tearful Serena herself. Serena is going to be more motivated than she was in any match this year, but Henin-Hardenne plans on going into her "woman in the iron mask" routine and surely won't back down easily.
"My motivation is going to be up also," Henin-Hardenne said. "I'm happy because after the French, I kept my motivation 100 percent. I'm going to try and win, even though it's going to be difficult."
In her straight-set quarterfinal win over Russian Svetlana Kuznetsova, Henin-Hardenne played about an offensive contest as you'll ever see from a 5-foot-5-inch waif. She belted her first serve, took huge cuts at her returns and seemed to be moving forward every moment, whipping her wondrous backhand both down the line and crosscourt. She's knows if she going to take down super-server Serena on grass, she had to get out her clay court retrieving mode. While Henin has taken three of their seven matches, all her victories have come on clay.
"I had to be very aggressive and go to net more today because it's true, I was thinking about the semifinals and saying, 'If you want to be aggressive against a player like Serena, you have to be aggressive against a player like Kuznetsova.' "
KIM/VENUS
Fred Mullane/Camerawork USA, Inc. |
Clijsters has been a Grand Slam contender since she nearly stunned Jennifer Capriati for the '01 French Open title. She has tremendous firepower and is a true sprinter with a long jumper's stretching ability, but she can be mentally fragile. She choked badly against Serena in the '02 Australian Open semis and barely showed up for her loss to in the French Open final. But the amazing thing about Clijsters is she goes from Grand Slam goat one week, to winning a grasscourt title in Holland two weeks later, to the Wimbledon semifinals after that. Bad losses just don't seem to get Lleyton Hewitt's jolly girlfriend down.
"I don't like losing and I'm disappointed, but it's never for very long," she said. "Then I get over myself and start working hard again."
Clijsters has a 2-4 record against Williams, but only one true win: a three-setter on clay in the final of '02 Hamburg. Clijsters other victory – which Venus refuses to call a defeat – was at the Home Depot Championship. However, the two went toe to toe in two hard court matches last summer, including when Clijsters nearly took Venus is a spectacular 6-4 in the third set loss in San Diego.
"You have to serve especially well against her," Clijsters said after her three-set win over Silvia Farina-Elia. "Once you get down a break, it's very tough to break her back. You have to keep believing in your chances, keep going for it to turn matches of around."
Clijsters knows that she's going to have to play superbly against Venus and taking tremendous risks unless Venus begins clanking balls – a scenario not entirely out of the realm of possibility. She'll have to go for her serves and try to hit winners with her returns. She cannot afford to have her forehand fly over the Tower of London.
The 20-year-old isn't sure if her best is good to enough to match Venus's best, but at least she knows that when push turns to an all-out slugfest, she's just as capable of throwing haymakers.
"I don't think we've played each other where were both at our best," she said. "Here it's going to be really tough because the ball hurts so much more and the serves much stronger. I'll have to be very, very aggressive."
Sounds like a Battle Royale in the making.
|
