Well, the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour season, which staggered to the finish line like a marathon runner whose legs turn to licorice after suffering cramps during the race, came to a merciful end on Sunday with the Williams sisters holding up the collapsing fort.
Wear and tear was evident on both sisters' bodies as Serena played with her left thigh taped and Venus wore heavy taping around her left knee.
UItimately it was Serena, who saved a match point in outdueling her sister in a three-set round-robin win, who had a little bit more left in the tank as she defeated defending champion Venus, 6-2, 7-6(4), to win her first season-ending Championships since 2001. The fact that the sisters, who are the two oldest players in the top 10, were still standing after a week that saw World No. 1 Dinara Safina, Victoria Azarenka, Vera Zvonareva and Caroline Wozniacki all retire from matches and/or withdraw from the event is a testament to their shared competitive will — and remember Venus and Serena carried a bigger burden playing in the doubles as well.
WTA Tour CEO Stacey Allaster drew a different conclusion in her year-end state of the game press conference yesterday.
"I think for me two other takeaways from this year's Championships. Just unbelievable matches. Long, hard‑fought matches where our athletes were really grinding it out and giving it their best," Allaster said. "A great way to finish this year with that level of play, intensity and competition."
While you can view part of that statement as executive spin, you cannot discount the desire Venus and Serena both displayed last week.
Serena completed the week with a 5-0 singles record and surpassed the injured and fragile Safina to claim the year-end No. 1 ranking. Venus went the distance in her first four matches, overcoming round-robin losses to Elena Dementieva and Serena — and played through a knee injurty to her second straight final.
Though Serena won just three titles during the season, they were three of the biggest ones — the Australian Open, Wimbledon and The Sony Ericsson Championships — and fittingly this generation's best player concludes the year restoring order to the Tour by finishing the year on top.
Looking back on the season that was, 2009 was a critical year for women's tennis.
Throughout the past two years, there has been a turnstile of turnover at the top of women's tennis. Justine Henin, Maria Sharapova, Ana Ivanovic, Jelena Jankovic, Safina and Serena are the six women who have held the No. 1 ranking since January of 2008.
Looking for the last woman to hold the top spot for one complete uninterrupted year? You have to go back to Henin, who was No. 1 for a 61-week consecutive stretch between March 19, 2007 and May 18, 2008 before giving way to Sharapova.
Now, you can argue that turnover at the top is good, that it shows the depth and balance in the women's game and generates interest in that several players have the potential to become No. 1. But when you look at how Safina, who is still seeking her first major title, struggled with injuries and emotional breakdowns at the end of the season, how so many top 10 players came down with injuries in Doha and the fact that Serena, while always a major force at Grand Slams won her first Tour event since April of 2008, then you must acknowledge in terms of consistency, the Tour was the shakiest it has been in years.
While it's not fair to compare the men's and women's games, just look at the fact that three of the four men's major finals this season — the Rafael Nadal vs. Roger Federer Australian Open final, the Federer vs. Andy Roddick Wimbledon final and the Juan Martin del Potro-Federer US Open final — spanned five sets and Federer's epic 16-14 win in the fifth set of the Wimbledon final over Roddick will be remembered as a classic.
In contrast, on the women's side you have not witnessed a Grand Slam singles final go the three-set distance since Amelie Mauresmo beat Henin, 2-6, 6-3, 6-4, in the 2006 Wimbledon final (Mauresmo announced last month she is contemplating calling it quits if she does not regain the desire to play). So if you're going to make the case that all that turnover at the top leads to actual competitive and exciting tennis in the final stages of majors, then where are the results to prove that point?
If you're looking for silver linings in the storm clouds of of controversial injuries, outbursts (see Serena in the US Open semifinals) and disappearing acts, fortunately there are signs of life.
The year did end on a positive note with Kim Clijsters' compelling return that saw her rise from off the rankings radar to beat four consecutive top 20 players — Venus, Na Li, Serena and Caroline Wozniacki — and capture the US Open championship in her first return to Flushing Meadows since she beat Venus, Sharapova and Mary Pierce to collect the 2005 title.
Ultimately, the two players who helped salvage the pained climax of the season are the Williams sisters, who remain two of the most widely recognized and marketabl athletes in women's sports. Whether they're playing singles or doubles, the sisters remain the top draws, generating interest and debate from fans and media. This has not changed since they turned pro and the late-season revival of Sharapova, the third true global superstar in women's tennis, was also a boon to the Tour.
So, Vee and Ree, who took time out from playing the fall season to attend college earlier in their careers, swooped in at the end to salvage some credibility for the WTA tour when it was most needed. The return of Henin and Clijsters and a full season of hopefully a healthy Sharapova next season should in fact shore up the faltering women's rankings. All five of those women have held the No. 1 ranking and won major titles and while Venus has not been No. 1 since 2002 all five of those players have the skills and competitive disposition to hold down the top spot for lengthy span in 2010.
Let's look at the Doha event and see what we learned about the state of the women's game.
Seven of the ten players, the original eight plus two alternates, were retrievers. Only the Williams sisters and Svetlana Kuznetsova represented offensive tennis (yes Azarenka can play more offensive as she did in winning Miami, but if you saw her delve into drop shot dream land in her final match then you saw yet another player revert to a retrieval status).
Elena Dementieva, although a very powerful baseline player, is basically a retriever in that she cannot consistently dictate play off her serve.
Stylistically speaking, the WTA hasn't been this weak since before the rise of Chris Evert.
The good news is Clijsters, Henin and Sharapova will help stabilize the top ten and bring the much needed heft of shot and offensive style of play so badly lacking.
There's absolutely nothing wrong with retrieval tennis. But in the 21st century, some offense is considered necessary to retain the interest of the fans and the sponsors. Not to mention the fact if you pair off the retrievers you're basically seeing the same style of tennis — an abundance of service breaks and counter-punching play — over and over.
That's another reason why the Williams sisters are so important. Skeptics say the sisters' finals are not as interesting because it's the same style. I say, the sisters' ambitious, aggressive brand of tennis sets them apart and makes them invaluable to the women's game because if you take them out of the equation, you've got the same style of play at the top.
Most members of the top 10 play not to lose points. The Williams sisters play to win those points and without these top tennis explorers leading the way you'd have a fleet of counter-punching ships circling the tournament harbors never discoring the New World of tennis.
Players like Dementieva, Woznicaki, Jankovic and Vera Zvonareva have very interesting games, but only the tennis astute have the understanding and the patience to watch them play.
However, smash-mouth tennis is what commands the ratings and camera action. The arrival of the Missing Three will go a long way toward balancing the play at the top of the WTA tour.
Their addition to the mix will also take a lot of pressure off the players who had difficulty dealing with leading the tour, such as Ivanovic, Safina and Jankovic.
"As we look to 2010, I must say I'm incredibly excited," Allaster said. "There's no doubt this economy, we're not immune to it, but we have done well. With this product that we see this week, with Kim coming back, Justine coming back, Maria, together with our rising stars, you've seen Caroline Wozniacki, Victoria Azarenka, Radwanska, how exciting they are, our Serbian stars with Jelena and Ana, all together with Venus and Serena, the dominance still of our Russian players with Svetlana, Dinara, Elena, we just have a terrific opportunity. It will be a really exciting 2010."
I concur with the CEO albeit with this crucial caveat — the top players must stay healthy for the Tour to realize its potential. I addressed the absurdity of Tour policy in my last column — Wozniack's Pain Should Be Lesson For WTA — and I hope Tour execs take it to heart.
If the marquee players can stay healthy, 2010 should be a very interesting year, indeed.
Whether you root for them or against them, you've got to give the Williams sisters credit for keeping the foundation firm in this house of shakes and quakes until the reinforcements arrive in January to help complete the refurbishing effort.
Tennis Week contributor Franklin L. Johnson has been an avid tennis player for more than 40 years and has written about the sport for two decades. The New York City native and former No. 2 singles player on his company team competing in a corporate league vividly recalls losing a marathon match at Forest Hills in the 1970s. He is a published poet who wrote A Lesson For The WTA, How Roger Can Beat Rafa, Serena's Cover Up, Ashe No Friend To Fans and Remember The Titans for this website.
