Serena Williams begins US Open with a convincing singles win over Garbine Muguruza. Photo: AFP/Getty Images
One day after she was named world No.1, Serena Williams opened the 2017 US Open with a comfortable, six-match winning streak. The 22-year-old Wimbledon champion, who earlier this month won the U.S. Open title, did so as the top seed and the third highest-ranked player in the draw. Though she did not quite match the performance, she remains as unbeatable and dominating as ever.
In the first of her matches on Monday, Williams, who is known to be a great finisher, took the No.4 seed by surprise with a straight-sets 6-all, 6-0, 6-0 win over Garbine Muguruza, who is ranked No.18. It was a comfortable victory and will go down as the first of 12 straight wins for Williams, who has only lost a single match in the six days since she defeated the Spaniard in a match in Miami last month. Her win over Muguruza at Arthur Ashe National Tennis Center (AATC) marked her 14th straight doubles win.
The Wimbledon champion, who is widely regarded as among the best female tennis players on the planet, entered the match ranked No.2. Her win in the opener did not mean she had already secured her No.1 ranking. Williams had not played a match on grass in more than a year and a half, and she also went out in the first round of the Olympics in Beijing and the Australian Open, where she lost to Ashleigh Barty. The top-ranked player entered the US Open having failed to defend her title at the All England Club (AEC) in London and Wimbledon.
In the women’s singles, Venus Williams, No.1 in the world, defeated Maria Sharapova in straight sets in one of Serena Williams’s first women’s singles matches since she won the Wimbledon title in August 2016. Sharapova had lost four of her previous five matches prior to her win over Serena Williams, and her run at the grand slam finals was a year shy of her seventh title. The victory marked Sharapova’s 15th victory on the season, which is tied for the seventh-best record in WTA Tour history.
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