“Your win has always been my win…. There is no way I would be at 23 without her….” – Venus and Serena, at the end of the Australian Opens.
Last weekend was hilarious and I remember my days as a Sports Editor, ATP Director and, of course, my playing days. In 1979, the Gomslam International had organised the Niger Golden Courts, the first Tennis Satellite Tournament independent of the Nigerian Tennis Federation in Minna, Niger, home state of the Federation’s President, Sani Ndanusa. Nigerian seeded players; Godwin Ameh, Sadiq Abubakar, etc. rushed to Minna to pick up points before the Clay Courts of Kaduna. I was happy I won that Tournament and went forward to organise the $75,000 NTC Ikeja Country Club ATP Tournament and the Enugu Premier Court International ATP Tournament.
I’m, therefore, dedicating my predictive piece, I wrote ten years ago, as the Washington DC Correspondent for the Vanguard on the Williams, to my fellow Tennis promoter, cricketeer and footballer, Chris Enahoro, who died last week, as the world was celebrating the legend of the William Sisters in Australia. Below are the excerpts….
Before she abandoned the Communist iron curtain, the Women Tennis Tour was an immaculate conference. At its purest tradition the game permits only the white coloured apparels for players entering to play in the all England Tennis Courts. Before her, the WTA distinctly was vast in elegance and breezy in entertainment. Martina Navratilova dominated all, until the German machine unleashed the greatest female player of the millennium.
Steffi Graff’s accomplishments in 1998 will be long remembered as, perhaps, the greatest of all time. She lost only two matches in 1998 and entered her name into the record books becoming the fifth person to ever capture the Grand Slam tournament in the same calendar year. To compliment this extraordinary feat Steffi became the only player in history to win an Olympic gold medal and a “Grand Slam” in the same year, thus claiming the “Golden Slam.”
During this period, the WTA witnessed more of baseline fisticuffs. The young men and women fresh from Tennis colleges were excited by the ladies text-book service, rallies and passing shots. It was always predictable when we see a champion emerge from the pack. Navratilova moved from the baseline curved her serve and was furiously charging and dropping the angular volleys. Towards her evening days, the Germans unleashed Steffi Graff and put a bomb to her forehand. Martina would dare approach the net, and the lady would pass with a cross-court forehand. Martina would try to go to the back-hand; the German would coil away from her backhand and unleash a booming down the line winner. With that wicked forehand, she did not bother much about her serve, did not bother about the net, all she did was to show a listless face, swung her forehand and the WTA records kept plummeting. Arriving on the centre court, and playing with so much consummate skills, character and charms, these divas gripped their audience like Celin Dion would wreak out catharsis, performing before soldiers, waiting for the green light to move into battle. Remember the unshaded Lesbian B.J King, the unforgettable Chris Evert, who fell in love and was jilted by Jimmy Connors. There was a shoplifting teenager, “Jennifer Capriatti.”
Monica Seles introduced the absolute power game to the women’s tour. Taking on the German, she threw back the bombs with snarling grunts, exploded her own bombs and missiles.
Meanwhile, new technologies added more power to the game. Racquets were grafted with aluminum and graphite. The services were thundering away at 207 miles per hour! The player that could overpower her opponent carried the day. Monica was on the way to retiring Steffi when in the middle of a tough tussle with the latter; a German fan descended on her and ripped her back with a knife. A shocked Monica Seles never recovered from the stab in the back. Whatever was tennis’ loss in that incident, Monica’s power game and mobility in the court changed the game for the women. Meanwhile, the German machine rolled on and the satellite beamed to the world’s Steffi’s listless face with an outstretched forehand with the blood of the victims knocked down by the bombs laced to her forehand.
It was at this time, sometime in 1989 when an American magazine asked Richard Williams the father and coach of the Williams Sisters to name the greatest player in the world. Richard pointed to his daughters: “My gals are the greatest players ever….” He concluded. He avoided any mention of Steffi, who, at the time, was the greatest female player of all time. Richard Williams’ claims impacted positively on his girls. Those boasts gave courage to the siblings. With enough willpower, the girls overcame any possible feeling of inferiority complex taken into consideration, the history and the evolution of Tennis as a “Class Act” in black American History. That psychological upliftement defined the emergence and glorious surge of the Williams sisters to the world’s top Tennis rankings. He more than any other teacher, studied the game, noted the effect of the new technologies and the match strategies of the former champions. To win, you must produce something different, lethal and new. Richard made his daughters carry weights and treated them to muscle building programmes. The training schedule was to transform those girls from mere tennis players to power grinders, intimidating machine ball crushers. This is an avant-garde menu never served in any Tennis Academy. If you are in doubt look at Serena without sleeves! Check out her ground strokes. A second look at Venus’ facial lines and it is clear her heritage is Sudanese. Lithe, with tall features, these Africans located south of Khartoum as the Nile glides its way from the Victoria Falls to the desert wastes, are Nubians.
The Williams’ victory at the U.S. Open is a victory for the experiment that jettisoned, grace and individuality to embrace raw power, mobility and the family participation. The plan to win was plotted by Richard Williams. Two sisters are trained as copilots of the same aircraft with instruction to fly the family to their desired destination. Woe betides the player who musters the nerve to stop any of the sisters. That is a sacrilege and the culprit must pay.
Later, on the final day, at the other end, the other sister emerges to administer the avenging poison. Williams’ interpretation of Tennis is an antithesis of a game first introduced inside the Royal Courts of King Louis of France two centuries ago. Richard and family indeed, supplanted the staid courtesies, the conservative boredom of the tours and presented to the advantage of the tube, to millions of fans the overthrowing spectacle that pictures the hairsplitting collusions of sexy flying amazons, prancing about the courts, without apologies, killing balls. By allowing the family to participate, lend support; the player in return gives her maximum concentration, to the game. This is the lethal weapon of the latest champions on the turf. From all indications, a tennis dynasty of Venus and Serena has been consecrated.