THE COMPTON WALL

Venus changes women's tennis … forever

By Matthew Cronin
tennisreporters.net

Susan Mullane Camerawork USA, Inc.

SAN DIEGO, AUG. 5 – Almost seven years ago, when Venus Williams first arrived in Oakland to play her first pro event, her coach at the time, Rick Macci, boldly declared that she would change the face of women's tennis.

Mark August 5, 2001 as the day that Venus Williams changed women's tennis forever.

In dropping a glacier on the red-hot Monica Seles in the final of the $750,000 Acura Classic, Venus played like no other woman has before her. OK, it's only a Tier II event in kicked back San Diego, but the field included the world's top five players plus Monica and none of them could hold a candle to Venus.

Williams is serving, moving and stroking her groundies so well right now that the only player who can stop her quest for a second U.S. Open title is herself. No player has ever served with such pace or meaningful spin. Williams terrorized Monica with flat blasts down the tee or wicked slice serves into all angles of the box. Now that she has her service toss mostly under control, Venus is becoming nearly as unbreakable as Pete Sampras.

"When I'm serving well, I'm really clear on how I want to hit it," said Williams. "I know where I want it go and I can see myself hitting it. When I'm double faulting a lot I'm not clear how where I want it too be. I lose my way. Right now, I'm hitting as I see fit. I'm not hitting as many kicks as I was, I'm just hitting flat slices and it's going in every time."

Note that – she has bagged her mediocre kick serve and brought back her
slick sliding slice, which she can whiz in at 110 mph. Seles, considered by
many to be the best retuner ever, said that she cannot get a read on Williams
bullets. "To my eyes, she using the same toss, so it's really difficult. Even
if I do get there, if it's a 115 mph serve, its very hard to return."

In the final game against Monica, served three straight slice serve aces away from Seles' backhand to capture the title.Who's the last player to do that?

"Everybody is beatable, but to beat Venus you have to have the same weapons and not many players do," said Seles. " She's a lot more consistent than she used to be and doesn't have many lapses. Venus has that very tough combo of a
great serve and powerful groundstrokes, plus she has incredible court coverage."

Frankly, when Venus decides to play, she covers the court as well or better than any player on tour. She's nearly impenetrable from the baseline, happily loping corner to corner and crushing back her opponents most valiant tries. She's speedy, has reach and is very steady.

Combine that with her improved technique on her forehand side, a scary swing
volley and a great deal of court savvy and you have THE NEW WOMAN PLAYER.
Call her the Compton Wall.

Monica said that only a a few players have the similar weapons -- Serena, Davenport, Clijsters and Henin. She added that Davenport obviously doesn't move as well and that Serena doesn't serve as well. tennisreprters.net will opine that Clijsters doesn't serve as well or isn't as steady, and the same can be said for Henin. Observe that Seles forgot or chose not to mention Capriati, who went after her for grunting to loud earlier in the week. It's pretty obvious that Jennifer doesn't have Venus' serve either, but we like her forehand better than Venus'.

Despite her standout play at Wimbledon and this week, Williams said she can
still get better.

"I want to improve my first serve percentage and move better because I'm not always on my toes," she said. "Other than that, I think I'm OK, because I'm playing the important points well. I have to force myself to move forward and not back off. I'm getting the effort out of myself that I want."

And how.