The last game of a legend?
After her elimination in the third round of the US Open on Friday, tennis star Serena Williams has announced that she will probably not be seen again on the tennis courts, where she has built one of the most careers prolific in all sports.
To the question "are you going to reconsider your decision to retire?"
“, the champion with 23 Grand Slam titles replied” I do not think so, but you never know “.
The American had just lost to Australian Ajla Tomljanovic (46th in the world) 7-5, 6-7 (4/7), 6-1.
We actually never know.
But many stars, including some close friends, did not wait to pay him a vibrant tribute to the occasion.
“Champion.
Heroin.
Legend forever!
tweeted TV star Oprah Winfrey, when former US First Lady Michelle Obama hailed "a young girl from Compton" who has become "one of the greatest sportswomen of all time."
Congrats on an amazing career, @SerenaWilliams!
How lucky were we to be able to watch a young girl from Compton grow up to become one of the greatest athletes of all time.
I'm proud of you, my friend—and I can't wait to see the lives you continue to transform with your talents.
pic.twitter.com/VWONEMAwz3
— Michelle Obama (@MichelleObama) September 3, 2022
“It has been an honor to follow your journey.
I just want to thank you for being this inspiration to so many,” NBA superstar LeBron James wrote.
Serena Williams, who will be 41 on September 26, announced at the beginning of August that she would soon stop competing, without saying where or when.
The New York Major, where she won in 1999, at 17, the first of her 23 Grand Slam titles, seemed to be the ideal way out.
“I wouldn't be Serena if it wasn't for Venus”
"It's been an incredible journey," she said, moved.
"Thank you dad, I know you're watching, thank you mom (who was present in the stands), thank you to all the people who have supported me all this time, my God it's been decades," she said. shelled, before totally bursting into tears, evoking his older sister: "I would not be Serena if it had not been for Venus, so thank you Venus".
Since her first professional encounter in Quebec City in 1995 (unranked, she had lost in the first qualifying round), Serena Williams has pushed back the barriers of her sport, of which she has become the undisputed queen in 27 seasons… Even if she failed to a small unit of the record of titles in Grand Slams held by the Australian Margaret Court (24).
Read also“Serena is another planet”: the Williams legend told by French tennis
After her last major title (Australia 2017) and the birth a few months later of her daughter Olympia, from her marriage to the co-founder of the social network Reddit Alexis Ohanian, she played four more finals (Wimbledon and US Open 2018, Wimbledon and US Open 2019) without managing to win his Grail.
She then gradually moved away from the circuit, devoting herself more and more, in addition to her role as a mother, to her additional activities, in particular in and around fashion, rather than to tennis.
Absent from the circuit since her retirement from injury in the first round of Wimbledon 2021, she had made a surprise return this summer in the Major on grass where she was again eliminated in the first round.
A few weeks later, after losing in the second round in Toronto and the first in Cincinnati, she therefore resolved to put away the rackets.