Venus (L) and Serena Williams of the U.S. talk before their ladies doubles match against Virginie Razzano of France and Aravane Rezai of France at the Wimbledon tennis championships, in London June 25, 2009. REUTERS.

Who wins the Williams War

By Bolade Oladoye

July 3, 2009 07:47PM

It's the Williams sisters final again! For the past nine All England Club championships one Williams or the other has been the winner seven times.

While today's final is going to be the eighth for the older of the Williams, Venus, it is going to be the fourth Wimbledon final for Serena.

At Wimbledon the sisters have a history. They have met four times - once in the semi-finals and thrice in the finals. Their first meeting at Wimbledon was in the year 2000 semi-final, and Venus carried the day on that occasion. But when it comes to the three times they have met in the finals, Serena has had the upper hand as she has beaten Venus twice, in 2002 and 2003, while Venus' only final success over her younger sister came in last year's final.

In today's final Venus is bidding to become the first woman since Steffi Graf in 1991-93 to win Wimbledon three years in a row. And to underscore how important today's final is to her, she is going to shed her garment of sister affinity and go for the jugular.

"I'm happy for her (Serena) to be in the final, but I have to face her and defeat her, I don't necessarily want her to lose, but for sure I want me to win. I don't want to see myself disappointed. I need to get my titles, too. I'm still the big sister, but I'm still going to play great tennis," Venus said.

If Venus succeeds in winning today she would have stopped Serena from winning her eighth major title. But if statistics are to go by, it will nearly be next to impossible for Venus to do this. There have been seven previous all-Williams championship matches at majors, and Serena holds a 5-2 lead.

Route to final for Serena Williams

Round 1: Serena Williams Beat Neuza Silva (Portugal) 6-1, 7-5

Round 2: Beat Jarmila Groth (Australia) 6-2, 6-1

Round 3: Beat Roberta Vinci (Italy) 6-3, 6-4

Round 4: Beat Daniela Hantuchova (Slovakia) 6-3, 6-1

Quarter Final: Beat number 8 seed-Victoria Azarenka (Belarus) 6-2, 6-3

Semi Final: Beat number 4seed-Elena Dementieva (Russia) 6-7(4), 7-5, 8-6

Route to final for Venus Williams

Round 1: Venus Williams Beat Stefanie Voegele (Switzerland) 6-3, 6-2

Round 2: Beat Kateryna Bondarenko (Ukraine) 6-3, 6-2

Round 3: Beat Carla Suarez Navarro (Spain) 6-0, 6-4

Round 4: Beat number 13 seed-Ana Ivanovic (Serbia) 6-1, 0-1 Ivanovic retired

Quarter Final: Beat number 11 seed-Agnieszka Radwanska (Poland) 6-1, 6-2

SF: Beat number 1-Dinara Safina (Russia) 6-1, 6-0

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Reader Comments (2)

Posted by Imran Fahd Faheem on Jul 04 2009

Serena wil definately win!

Posted by olugbemiga agbebi on Jul 04 2009

its going to be a fantastic final b'cos either way it goes, its a bonus for the Williams family.