Wimbledon: Ghosts of Centre Court no aid to Sharapova

The old adage of John McEnroe's close friend, the late Vitas Gerulaitis, was a slim dream to cling to for Maria Sharapova to make it to another Wimbledon final.

It was suggested his ghost might rise up on Centre Court and embrace the Russian player so that she might turn to the BBC camera after her match against Serena Williams, as Gerulaitis had done after Jimmy Connors in the 1980s, and declare with a reasonable degree of self-deprecation that nobody beats Maria Sharapova 17 times in a row.

Well, Williams does. What can be said of Sharapova is that despite losing the match from game one, where she double faulted three times to hand over her service to Williams, she fought and kicked and scratched her way through a match that seemed almost predetermined to fall the American’s way. Her bottle was apparent. But the match was a romp for the world number one.

Lost causes

Because Sharapova spills blood in lost causes, she remained dignified and that might have been her only triumph on the day. Her fragile serve belied her standing as one of the world’s great players, where the Williams delivery was a poisonous delight.

Sharapova recovered from shoulder reconstruction in 2008 but her serve did not and as if to neatly round off the match Williams ended on three aces in the 6-2, 6-4 win just as Sharapova began in the despairing froth of a hat-trick of doubles faults.

In between there was ups and downs in points but never games or sets. The 28-year-old world number four, five years younger than her opponent, never earned a break point on the Williams serve and chased the match from the first dissolute game.

Williams added another service break for 4-1 in the first set, which unfolded without alarm to her courtside box, where her beaten sister Venus sat in support. A largely silent crowd looked on the inevitable for 33 minutes as the set finished 6-2.

Sharapova picked up in the second stanza but her second serve was the low fruit of her game. Williams plucked and gorged on them and when Sharapova tried to add weight, she double faulted.

Williams’s second set break came in the fifth game, when Sharapova’s 43rd double fault of the tournament opened the door wide again. She served for 4-2 and that was the match complete. There was no way back a set and break down to arguably the best player in the history of the women’s game.

Williams now meets Garbine Muguruza. How the Spaniard will fare in the final against a 20-times Grand Slam champion depends on whether she can handle the magnitude of her first Wimbledon final. The past is littered with players crushed by the occasion of a final rather than their opponent.

Immediately after Williams won she rolled up to the cameras smiling and declared that the Spaniard had beaten her before. It was in the French Open second round last year.

“ . . . She made me improve,” added the American with a 100-watt smile.

Sharapova was far from smiles: “Press conferences are always about 30 minutes or 45 or an hour after a match,” she said. “It’s tough to come in here after a loss as a competitor and give you many smiles or certain explanations.”

Heavyweights

There wasn’t much to explain in the battle of the heavyweights because there was just one. In her eighth Wimbledon final, Williams’s mood was a little lighter. “When she stepped up her game I was able to step up mine,” said Williams. “It wasn’t easy out there, it was interesting. It’s the semi-final of Wimbledon. You go in there and you don’t want to lose.”

And her opponent in the final Muguruza? “I lost to her last year, said Williams. “It was an eye opening loss for me. Some losses you’re angry about, and some losses you learn from. That loss I think I learned the most from in a long time.”

Against Agnieszka Radwanska, the 21-year-old Muguruza hung in after six poor games in the second set and beginning of the third and allowed the Pole back into the match.

In the end Muguruza’s power and precision, which had temporarily deserted her, trumped Radwanska’s placement and athletic fetching game, her huge backhand in particular sending her opponent scampering into the corners with no way back.

What may now be seen is heat rising from the Radwanska camp after her box called a ball out in the dying seconds of the match. Radwanska heard the call and held up her racquet mid-point to call a challenge just as Murguruza’s return forehand landed out.

However the point called out by the Polish player’s team was shown to be in by Hawk-Eye. It gave Murguruza match point on her serve at 5-3 and she closed out the match 6-2, 3-6, 6-3. The disgust on Agnieszka’s face aimed at her team remained there frozen as she disappeared into the Centre Court tunnel. “I don’t have words to explain it,” said the Spanish player. “I heard some people say out, out. I was praying it was on the line.”

Radwanska chose not to vent her frustration in public. “It was 50-50 call on that ball. I decide to challenge,” she said. “Wasn’t really a good decision. I did it because I’m the one to decide if I challenge or not. Nobody can do that for me.”