Serena Williams: “Pressure is a Privilege”

She has been dominating the tennis era for almost two decades now. The sound produced with her racket resonates the entire stadium. The 23-time Grand Slam champion, Serena Williams makes America proud with every match she plays. Irrespective of her supremacy on the court there is always a load on her shoulders which pushes her to do better and better on the battlefield. Due to her predominance on the court, the world has an elated extent of expectation from the American GOAT. During this year’s Wimbledon, she was ranked 181st on the WTA list and seeded 25 at the SW19 major. And when the tournament concluded she moved 153 places up in her ranking. 

“It’s definitely not easy”, Williams said. “It definitely takes its toll on you when you’re a favourite, no matter what you’re ranked. Even when I came back after the whole situation, I think it was in 2011, I was still a favourite to win the Open. I got to the final. But who would have thought after all that I would still be a favourite? Yeah, it’s okay. Like, I always lean on Billie Jean King’s words when she says that pressure is a privilege. I’d much rather have people look at me that way than any other way”.

Since the inception of the Open Era, the American women, Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, Billie Jean King and the Williams sisters have dominated the tennis world with their racquets. Williams was also interrogated upon the future of American tennis. “Well, the ’70s and ’80s sounds like a great theme party (laughter),” Williams said.”But I don’t know. I think women’s tennis is doing really well on the American side. Yeah, suggestions? It’s kind of hard. You have to pour a lot of money into players. It’s very difficult on the men because there are so many other American sports that men want to do, that you can be so successful in. Then you have tennis, which is definitely more an international sport. I don’t know. It’s really interesting. But I think the state of women’s tennis right now for the U.S. is really excellent and I’m really excited about it”.