\n<\/p>\n
The Williams sisters – who will team up again for the doubles here – are synonymous with Wimbledon. <\/p>\n
For a 19-year period, at least one Williams sister was in all but four singles finals at SW19. They won a combined 12 Wimbledon singles titles – seven for Serena and five for Venus – between 2000 and 2016. Elder sister Venus won it first. Little sister Serena won it more.<\/p>\n
When they combined they were dominant, winning six women’s doubles titles together. When they faced one another it was absorbing – two players who knew each other’s games inside out, from years spent on the practice courts in Compton, California.<\/p>\n
If you think of the Williams sisters you see them in the Wimbledon whites, moving around a grass court, two beautiful service motions, with athleticism, power, and touch at the net to boot.<\/p>\n
As Serena said – it is not every day Wimbledon holds a wildcard for someone.<\/p>\n
“I can name probably like a handful of people. I happened to be one of them,” she said.<\/p>\n
“I thought, ‘I should really take this opportunity’. Who knows if I’ll ever make it here again? This could be it. <\/p>\n
“I was like, ‘What’s wrong with you, Serena? What are you thinking? Are you nuts?’ I have this great opportunity to showcase what I do best.”<\/p>\n
Will her age and all that comes with it – being half a step slower out of the corners of the court, having to conserve more energy the longer a match goes on – be too tough to overcome?<\/p>\n
Or will her aura, the sheer sense of simply just being Serena Williams, be enough to carry her through the opening round at least?<\/p>\n
David Quayle, Williams’ British hitting partner who helped her prepare for her return in the doubles at Queen’s earlier in June, says it is “hard sometimes not to feel a little bit nervous” around Williams. <\/p>\n
“It’s a funny thing to see someone that you have watched their serve on TV for so many years, and then all of a sudden that serve is coming at you,” he told BBC Sport in June.<\/a><\/p>\n “You’re fighting between admiring some of the shots and actually playing them. She’s got that kind of aura.<\/p>\n “I’m starting to getting a little bit more used to seeing her over the other side of the net, but every day is special.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n