How Serena Williams could finally break the Grand Slam record

Playing the Australian Open at 39, Serena Williams is again trying to block one of the last pieces of the puzzle of her magnificent career.

Widely considered one of the greatest tennis players of all timeWilliams’ only remaining obstacle is the Grand Slam record for a troubled Margaret Court, who played in an era with weaker competition. With 23 Grand Slam titles, Williams needs one more to tie and two to overtake Court in the overall count. She came terribly close, winning many Grand Slam matches, but has suffered a series of final stumbles since her return from having a child in 2017.

So, what went wrong in the eight Grand Slam losses since his return? Observers blamed everything from age to nerves and poor conditioning. But an analysis of the statistics from those eight Grand Slam losses reveals a pretty obvious umbrella of differences between what happened in the loss and how Williams usually plays.

It is not your withdrawal speed. In 2015, when Williams dominated the sport by capturing three of the four Slams, his average speed on the first serve was 109 mph – identical to his last Grand Slam defeat at the hands of Victoria Azarenka. Williams’ percentage of first served hits has been mixed in those matches. She has been at or near the ideal of about 65 percent of the first serves that resulted in half of the eight Grand Slam losses. Their percentages in the remaining half were too high or too low, but the performance spot in that area is not enough to point to a trend. In this data set of Grand Slam losses, their averages were around the average of 65% of the first withdrawals, which makes it unlikely to be a chronic problem at the moment. In addition, his winning percentage on the first serve is stable: in his three most recent Grand Slam losses, Williams’s winning percentage on his points on the first serve was 74 percent, 70 percent and 72 percent – all aligned with the top 10 players on the WTA Tour in 2020. There has to be something else going on.

Imagine James Carville sitting in front of a group of tennis gurus trying to understand why Williams has yet to stand out. For these specialists, he can say: “It’s the return, stupid”.

Outside the metrics related to the service, a mountain of meaning is built in the statistical category “earned return points” because the points played in the return represent approximately half of all the points played. Like many statistics in tennis, it is more useful to view this category as a percentage rather than a gross number of points, as tennis matches can vary widely in the overall number of points played.

Williams seems to feel that his problem is in his return. After losing to experienced Wang Qiang in the third round of the Australian Open last year, she said: “I didn’t come back like Serena. Honestly, if we were just honest with ourselves, it’s all on my shoulders. I lost that match. … I literally can’t do that again. This is not professional. Is not cool. “

In that match of three sets, Williams made 30 mistakes when returning from the serve. She still almost pulled the match, losing 7-5 in the third set. Imagine if she had found a way to put only half of those 30 returns into play. And no, detonating a bunch of return winners to make up for all the mistakes didn’t even make things right – she only had seven return winners for those 30 mistakes.

Looking at the percentage of return points earned by Serena in her eight Grand Slam losses since her return, the trend is outside her general benchmarks that span the season.

These defeats show a tendency for the percentage of return points to gain mainly in the 1930s, a departure from its normally solid return game. By comparison, overall in 2020, it gained remarkably better 44 percent of its return points, and in the Williams banner year in 2015, its share of earned return points was 48 percent. Looking at its history of return points over the past decade, it is possible that its success rate in this category needs to be in its 40s for it to win, while percentages in its 30s leave it vulnerable.

In 2019, the last full year of professional tennis before the pandemic, the 60 best players on the WTA Tour had percentage points of return throughout the season in the 1940s. Simply put, it is the track where the most successful women in tennis reside. .

Also, consider that earning a return point is more than the return stroke itself.

Historians agree that Williams is one of the best returners of all time. She is a woman capable of returning the serve at 138 mph to a male player with a burst of victory. Her return speeds sometimes far exceed the serve speed she hit.

Isn’t Serena putting enough returns in the game – whether by accessing, missing the shot or betting too much?

The answer is: sometimes.

According to Tennis Abstract, most important women in the world put between 75 and 83 percent of their returns at stake. This means that they are difficult to hit, but they also make few mistakes in the return shots.

In the 2018 loss to Angelique Kerber, Williams’ share of the returns in play was acceptable at 71%. However, in the final loss of the US Open to Bianca Andreescu, Williams’ return at stake dropped to just 63 percent. It was just a two-set match in which Serena made 19 return errors – or almost two return errors per game received.

The return is not the only time a player can lose at a return point, of course. There is at least some indication that Williams may also be struggling with his next shot after a return hit in play. Where data on the length of the rally is available for these Grand Slam losses, in at least four of them, Williams lost the battle for the short points, which tennis statistics holders rate as 0 to 4 strokes. In the tournaments that ended with defeats for Wang, Naomi Osaka and Karolína Plíšková, Williams had already won all the short-point battles that led to the defeats. It is an indication of a rapid drop in points – at least in Grand Slam matches she is losing.

What is potentially most notorious about Williams’ diminished performance in the category of earned return points is the caliber of the servers she is missing. In those eight defeats in the Grand Slam, she faced two notably elite servers in Osaka and Plíšková. It is almost forgivable not to go well against these two. But the rest? You would think Williams would be delighted with his withdrawals. Andreescu, Azarenka, Kerber, Wang, Simona Halep and Sofia Kenin are nowhere near the 2020 WTA Top 10 in aces or percentage of first service points earned.

However, this group of players contains supreme defenders and fast runners. The only way to find out why Williams is slipping in his game back against these players may be to get inside his head, but it is possible that the specter of entering long, drawn out race points against them is weighing on him, consciously or not. .

Although Williams does not need the Grand Slam record to cement her greatness, it would be satisfying for her and her fans if she completed the task. A direct reinforcement of her return game – taking care to put returns in play and seeking to extend the receipt of rallies – could help her overcome the last obstacle.