Wuhan, China: World number one Serena Williams said on Monday that playing less tennis has helped extend her glittering career, as she acknowledged in the wake of Li Na’s retirement that players’ bodies can “betray” them.
The American power hitter was speaking as she prepared to compete in China’s Wuhan Open, a WTA premier-ranked event that will hold its final on Saturday, the day after her 33rd birthday.
China’s Li Na announced her retirement last Friday at the age of 32, citing chronic knee injuries, just months after she won her second Grand Slam.
Williams and her sister Venus opted in the past few years to play less, a decision once bitterly criticised by pundits as disrespectful of the game.
But she celebrated her 18th Grand Slam victory at the US Open earlier this month and shows no signs of losing her status as the world’s greatest female player.
“As for playing less, I think throughout my career it’s definitely been able to help me have a longer career,” Williams said.
“I think next year something I definitely want to continue to do is really focus on breaking records in the slams and doing the best I can in those events and the ones leading up to those.”
Williams said she spent little time practising before the $2.4 million (Dh8.8 million) Wuhan tournament, but was “ready”.
However, she has spoken in the past of her rigorous physical regime, telling reporters after her victory in New York: “I train really hard and I never want to stop.”
But, following the retirement of China’s tennis trailblazer, Williams acknowledged that all top athletes are at risk when pushing their bodies to the limit.
“I think at one point or another all of our bodies at some point betray us,” Williams said, before paying tribute to Li.
“For the most part, I think Li Na is great. I think I summed it up: She’s a star that is in the sky that always shines. It’s always going to be there.”
Following Williams’ victory at Flushing Meadows, some pundits said she could go on to break Steffi Graf’s record of 22 Grand Slams in the Open era.
But Williams said she was focusing solely on the short term. “I am not thinking about number 22 at all,” she said. “I’m thinking about number 19.”
In Monday’s action on court, Sara Errani reeled off the last six games of the match against Heather Watson of Britain to advance to the second round 7-5, 6-4.
After dropping the opening set, Watson came back to take 19 of the first 22 points of the second to race out to a 4-0 lead. But the 11th-seeded Errani broke Watson’s serve three times to close out the match in temperatures hovering around 30 degrees Celsius.
“It was a really tough match. It was very hot today and she was playing very well,” the Italian player said. “Very good forehand, very good serve — it wasn’t easy for me, but I’m happy I could win the match.”
Australian Open finalist Dominika Cibulkova of Slovakia, the No. 12 seed, retired with a left ankle injury in the opening game of the third set after splitting the first two sets against American Madison Keys, 4-6, 6-3.
In other matches, Australian qualifier Jarmila Gajdosova defeated 15th-seeded Flavia Pennetta of Italy 6-1, 6-4, and Germany’s Sabine Lisicki, a winner two weeks ago in Hong Kong, continued her good form with a 7-5, 2-6, 6-3 win over 14th-seeded Lucie Safarova.
