Venus happy to be back

TORONTO – Seven-time Grand Slam champion Venus Williams, who launched her Toronto WTA campaign yesterday, believes the back trouble that forced her out of Wimbledon is behind her. Williams suffered her earliest French Open exit in 12 years in May, when she crashed to a first-round defeat to Poland’s Urszula Radwanska.

She then pulled out of Wimbledon, but said on Monday she thinks she’s fit enough to mount a challenge on the hard-courts at Montreal, with an eye to the last Grand Slam of the year at the US Open later this month.

“I just started to realise that I couldn’t play, especially since I didn’t have a serve,” she said of her decision to take a lengthy break. “It was just really hard to play without a serve, I found out – especially such a huge part of my game. I feel like I’m at the point now where I can hit the ball pretty well,” she added.

Williams was scheduled to face Belgian Kirsten Flipkens in the first round yesterday.
She warmed up for that with a doubles exhibition on Monday night with sister Serena, the world number one and top seed, along with retired WTA great Monica Seles and young Canadian Eugenie Bouchard.

First-round action got underway earlier in the day, when Belgian Yanina Wickmayer defeated American lucky loser Bethanie Mattek-Sands 6-4, 2-6, 6-4 to book a second-round meeting with third-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland.

Mattek-Sands gained a place in the draw after Britain’s Laura Robson withdrew on Monday morning with a right wrist injury. Robson was the latest injury casualty in the event, which had already seen world number two Victoria Azarenka and number three Maria Sharapova opt out.-Sport24.