Serena Williams disrespected Wimbledon and paid the price

Maria Sakkari and Marta Kostyuk can testify to that fact, having hit with Serena Williams in the run-up to Wimbledon, and having watched some of those sessions, I thought that Williams would be competitive in the main draw.

And she was, to a point, beaten in over two hours by a respectable scoreline of 6-3 6-7 6-3.

But did she really expect to turn up to one of the biggest tournaments in the world after four years out of the game, play a grand total of zero competitive singles matches and give a good account of herself?

“I’m still not even sure,” Williams had admitted of her ability to compete in singles, two days before her first-round match.

She had basically accepted a wildcard, so she claimed, because it’s not every day that an organisation like the All England Club holds a space back for you. She almost implied she felt obliged to play.

But no one was forcing her. She said her goal was not winning but having fun – although anyone who has watched Williams’s career knows that she has the most fun when she is winning, and the least when she is not.

This comeback has been months in the making, Williams having rejoined the anti-doping pool late last year and said to have been for months in preparation for a grass-court return.

But her matches leading up to Wimbledon were all in doubles, a format she will play later this week with her sister Venus.

Those that came to see her probably didn’t mind too much. One voice calling out “we love you Serena” was surely too young to remember Williams the first (or second) time around, and so for them and thousands of others it was an evening well spent.

But you don’t have to peel back many layers to discover the relative mockery this match made of the wildcard system. Her opponent Maya Joint, ranked 87th in the world, was the perfect draw, given she has barely won all year: the Australian had lost 13 of her last 14 matches. Her last completed tour-level victory was against Sofia Kenin in early January. It was such a good draw for Serena that even usually well-adjusted commentators mooted that it could hardly have been rigged better.

Of course, it wasn’t rigged, but as far as opportunities go, a 20-year-old on the worst run of her career was a pretty good one.

But Williams summarily failed to take it. Her serve and return were her best shots, because they are skills you can refine on the doubles match court, and she leaned on them in key moments, or if Joint made the mistake of hitting the ball back to her.

When she had to move though, running into the corners of the court, she could not unleash the signature power. Williams either resorted to defensive moonballs or netting forehands. It was hardly a signature performance. At one point, she gave up on a ball that was closer to the centre line than the sideline, because she could not cover the few yards required to get it back.

And even if no one in the stands cared, consider what message it sends to the rest of the tour when what is supposed to be a meritocratic landscape contorts itself to accommodate a 44-year-old woman – one who didn’t even bother with a practice match before playing on a stage most players would give their eye teeth to grace.

Had Williams passed on the wildcard, as perhaps she should have done, the next on the entry list would have been accepted: Katie Volynets, a jobbing pro on the verge of the world’s top 100. The £80,000 prize money, even if she had lost, would have meant a lot more to her than Williams’s first tennis cheque since 2022.

There was some satisfying dissonance between events on Centre and No 1 Court. A few hundred yards away, finishing within a few minutes of Williams vs Joint, Stan Wawrinka was giving his all in what he has already said will be his last Wimbledon. Against former finalist Matteo Berrettini, he fought for the moments that he says are what has kept him coming back at 41 years old.

It was in vain in the end, Berrettini winning three of the four tie-breaks, and allowing his Swiss opponent to speak on the court – losers are usually allowed to exit quickly before the winner addresses the crowd. But having played more than 20 singles matches already this year, and won eight of them, Wawrinka was a worthy wildcard.

Was Serena? At best, Williams was negligent in her approach to this match. At worst, downright disrespectful. Did anyone who counted themselves lucky enough to have a ticket care? Probably not. But players and fans who care deeply about the sport would strongly disagree.