2016 Williams Watch- Serena To The French Open Finals!

It has been a French Open at Roland Garros in which they have battled through rain delays, cold temperatures and the field being decimated by upsets and injuries, but Serena Williams has survived.

She dispatched the red hot Kiki Bertens of the Netherlands in straight sets at Court Philippe Chatrier to punch her ticket to the French Open finals 7-6 (9-7), 6-4 but she had to fight for it.

Trailing 4-2 and noting that Bertens was hobbled a bit by a strained left calf, Little Sis zeroed in on that to flip the match script.  While everyone on tour knows that she can hit with power and is undeniably the best shotmaker in the women's game, many people forget that she can also hit an amazing deft drop shot, and she repeatedly deployed it against Bertens to get back in the match..

Like the great champion she is, Serena survived and advanced.  She's now made it to her 27th Grand Slam final and her second consecutive French Open final.  Serena is also playing for her 22nd Grand Slam title to pass Steffi Graf and get her closer to Margaret Court's 24 Grand Slam titles.

Standing in her way of making more tennis history is number four seed Garbine Muguruza of Spain, who dispatched 21st seeded Samantha Stosur of Australia in straight sets 6-2, 6-4 in the other semifinal at Court Suzanne Lenglen.

If that name sounds familiar, she was the player responsible for shockingly knocking Serena out in the 2012 French Open second round in lopsided fashion, which Little Sis beating her in last year's Wimbledon final in straight sets.

But tomorrow Williams will be playing her fourth straight match while Muguruza will be playing her third straight one  because of all the rain delays.  

Will she handle her business tomorrow and make this business trip to Paris a successful one?   We'll see.

2016 Williams Watch-Serena To The French Open Semis!

It took her three sets, but number one seed Serena Williams fought through a bad day at the office and a short rain delay  to prevail over a determined Yulia Putintseva  5-7, 6-4, 6-1 to punch her ticket to the French Open semifinals.

Serena got off to a slow start in large part to the 24 unforced errors she sprayed all over Court Philippe Chatrier in the first set.  Despite that display of error infused tennis, she was serving at 5-5 in the first set up 40-love but got broken, then Putintseva took advantage of the huge gift to serve out the set and become the first person in this edition of the French Open to take a set from the tournament's number one seed.  

Williams ended up with 43 unforced errors to just 16 for Putintseva, but offset that with 36-16 advantage in winners.  Little Sis woke up just in time at 4-4 to rally and take that second set with some timely assistance from Putintseva.  She was down two break points but held serve to take a 5-4 lead, then broke Putintseva to take the second set to even the match when Putintseva double faulted.

Serena then found her A game and blew out Putintseva in the third set to take the match.

She will face the red hot Kiki Bertens of the Netherlands, who is on a roll and has taken down four seeded players in number 3 Angelique Kerber, number 25 Daria Kasatkina, number 15 Madison Keys and number 8 Timea Bacsinszky on the way to the semifinals and qualifying for the Dutch Olympic tennis team .

 Fourth seeded Garbine Muguruza and 21st seeded Samantha Stosur will square off in the other women's semifinal.match

2016 Williams Watch- One Sister Still In The French Open, One Sister Is Out

It has been a rainy few days in Paris during this 2016 edition of the French Open that has not only seen rain delays that have wiped out whole days of play, but many of the seeded players falling on the women's side.

That pattern continued in the fourth round after two days of rain delayed play once again in which number two seed Agnieszka Radwanska, number 4 seed Garbine Muguruza, number 6 seed Simona Halep and number 12 seed Carla Suarez-Navarro all fell.

So did number 9 seeded Venus Williams in straight sets to number 8 seeded Timea Bacsinzsky 2-6, 4-6 to end her time at Roland Garros.

But 'Williams'-don will be cranking up on June 27-July 12 on the other side of the Channel.  See you then Big Sis.

Meanwhile, number one seeded Serena cruised to the quarterfinals after blitzing Elina Svitolina in straight sets 6-1, 6-1 to set up her quarterfinal match with Yulia Putintseva, who upset Carla Suarez-Navarro in a hard fought 7-5, 7-5 straight set match.

Should Little Sis prevail against Putintseva, she would take on the winner of the Timea Bacsinzsky-Kiki Bertens match.   Bertens is on a roll, and now that she has qualified for the Dutch Olympic tennis squad in Rio by getting past the third round in a emotional 6-2,3-6,10-8 three set win over Daria Kasatkina, the pressure on her entering the tournament has been lifted.   She could be a dangerous opponent for the eighth seeded Bacsinzsky.  

But once again, you have to play the matches.

2016 Williams Watch-Rolling To The Fourth Round

My fave tennis playing sisters are having a marvelous business trip to Paris so far as we cruise into the second week of the French Open.

Serena is chasing history and another French Open title as usual, while Venus is striving to get back to the elite level of tennis she was playing before she was diagnosed with the autoimmune ailment that has sidetracked her for several years.

This 2016 French Open women's tournament has already witnessed nine seeded players fall in the first round, two in the second and another nine in the third round.   But two of the ten seeded players still left in this 2016 edition of the French Open women's tourney have the last name Williams, and eight of them are bumping heads in the fourth round.

Serena, the tournament's number one and still world number one ranked player is handling her French Open business, and so far hasn't dropped a set on the way to the fourth round and hopefully her fourth French Open title.

She took out Slovakia's Magdalena Rybarikova in straight sets 6-2, 6-0 in her opening round match,  Brazil's Teliana Pereira 6-2, 6-1, and 26th seeded French homegirl Kristina Mladenovic 6-4, 7-6 (12-10). She will face 18th seeded Elina Svitolina of Ukraine in her fourth round match.  .

Should she get past Svitolina, she would face in the quarters the winner of the match between 12th seeded Carla Suarez-Navarro of Spain and Kazakhstan's Yulia Putintseva.

Ninth seeded Venus is trying to win her first ever French Open title in her illustrious career.  But her road to that first title and the fourth round has been tougher.  Big Sis has had to play several tiebreakers on the way to her fourth round match with number eight seeded Swiss miss Timea Bacsinszky.

She played a tough opening round match with Estonia's Anett Kontaveit, prevailing in straight sets 7-6 (7-5),7-6 (7-4).   Big Sis then sent fellow American qualifier Louisa Chirico to the sidelines by beating her in straight sets 6-2 , 6-1.

In the third round, like Little Sis, she faced a French homegirl in Alize Cornet.   But unlike Serena, it took her three sets to win this match.

Venus captured the first set 7-6 (7-5), dropped the second set 1-6, and blitzed Cornet in the third set 6-0 to punch her ticket to the fourth round match with Bacsinszky.

Should Venus survive this match, she would take on in the quarters the winner of the match between the Netherlands Kiki Bertens and 15th seeded Madison (I'm not Black) Keys

Should my fave tennis playing sibling survive their quarterfinal matches, they would play each other in the semifinals..

The Williams sisters were also entered in the French Open doubles this year, but were knocked out in the third round of the doubles tournament by Kiki Bertens and Johanna Larsson in straight sets 3-6, 3-6.

Oh well, there's always the 'Williams'-don doubles in a few weeks. .

We'll see how this second week of their Paris business trip plays out and if one of them is holding the Coupe Suzanne Lenglen on Saturday.

2016 Williams Watch-Time For The French Open

We are still in the month of May, and that means it's time for the second Grand Slam tournament on the professional tennis calendar.  It's the 2016 French Open, and the clay courts of Paris' Roland Garros await as the tournament is scheduled to run from May 22-June 5

The big story as usual is world number one Serena Williams and her attempt to win her 22nd Grand Slam title.  Little Sis has unfortunately been upset in her last two attempts to get that title, falling in the 2015 US Open semis and in this year's Australian Open title match.

So you know the defending French Open champ is ready and eager to get this milestone done and over with Williams-don and the Rio Olympics looming.

She's seeded number one in this 115th edition of the French Open, and Serena kicks off her title defense with a first round match against Serbia's Magdalena Rybarikova.   should she handle her tennis playing business she gets the winner of the Teliana Pereira- Kristyna Pliskova match.

Venus Williams is also in this tournament, and she's seeded number 9.  She faces off in the first round against Estonia's Anett Kontaveit.   Should Big Sis win this opening round match, she'll face the winner of an all-American first round battle between Louisa Chirico and Lauren Davis.

Unfortunately the Williams sisters are in the same half of the draw, and would potentially meet in the semis should both sisters go on extended runs during their time at Roland Garros.

Here's hoping my fave tennis playing siblings have a successful business trip to Paris, and Serena finally gets her 22nd Grand Slam title to tie her with Steffi Graf and add another Coupe Suzanne Lenglen to her trophy case..

2016 Williams Watch- Number 22 On Hold

The Australian Open women's title was on the line, and I was up at 2 AM Houston time to watch the action from Down Under and see if Serena Williams would capture her seventh title, take home another Daphne Akhurst Memorial Cup and win her 22nd Grand Slam title to tie Steffi Graf for second on the women's all time Grand Slam tournament win list.

Fittingly her opponent was 28 year old lefty Angelique Kerber of Germany, who grew up idolizing Graf and does have a recent win against Serena

But this is a Grand Slam final, and Serena is usually on her A+ game for those.  But she wasn't today, and was upset by Kerber 4-6, 6-3. 4-6 to capture her first major Grand Slam title

Meanwhile Serena is still not only the world's number one ranked player even with the loss, she's sitting on 21 major title wins.

Oh well, the French Open is in May.   We'll see what happens there..

2016 Williams Watch - Going For Number 22

In a few hours we'll find out if Serena Williams will earn her seventh Australian Open title and 22nd Grand Slam title win in her illustrious career.

That Aussie Open women's final will start at 2 AM CST.

She punched her ticket to this Australian Open final by taking out fourth seeded Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland for the ninth time in straight sets 6-0, 6-4.   She not only bumped her record against Radwanska to a spotless 9-0. she continued her impressive march through this Aussie Open women's field.

For the first time in her career, she has made it to an Australian Open final without dropping a set along the way.

Serena's reward or doing so will be to face Germany's Angelique Kerber, the 28 year old lefthander who idolized Steffi Graf growing up, and who will be standing in the way of Serena trying to tie her idol for Grand Slam title wins.  Kerber is also the first German player in 20 years to reach a Grand Slam final since you know who.

The seventh seeded Kerber knocked off #14 seeded Victoria Azarenka 6-3, 7-5 in the quarters and surprise semifinalist Johanna Konta 7-5. 6-2 in straight sets to get to her first ever Grand Slam final, and says she relishes the challenge of taking on the world's number one player.

We'll see if she feels the same way in a few hours.  Go get her Serena!

2016 Williams Watch- Serena To The Australian Open Semis!

The 2016 Australian Open keeps rolling to its conclusion, and Serena Williams is still on track to claim her seventh Australian Open title, her 22nd Grad Slam title to tie Steffi Graf overall, and start a run at a Golden Slam.

But standing in the way in the quarterfinal round was a woman she'd beaten 17 straight times in fifth seeded Maria Sharapova of Russia.   The last time she'd lost to Sharapova was in 2004, and since then it's been all Serena all the time

This one started out with Serena getting off to a slow start and dropping her initial service game to get into an 0-2 hole and get her haters around the wold salivating.  But she eventually got it to 4-4 and after a tense four deuce game held to take the lead and eventually break Sharapova to take the first set.  

Serena then kicked it into A+ level and rolled to a 4-0 lead before Sharapova broke the five game un by holding serve.  But Serena once again held her serve and broke Sharapova to win the match in straight sets 6-4, 6-1.   It was the 18th straight win for Little Sis and the seventh straight time in their non rivalry she'd beaten Sharapova in straight sets.

Next up in the semis for Serena is fourth seeded Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland who sent #10 seeded Carla Suarez Navarro of Spain to the sidelines in straight sets 6-1, 6-3.

If she handles her semifinal business, these are the potential opponents who could be standing between her and her seventh Australian Open title.

That half of the quarterfinal bracket has #14 seeded Victoria Azarenka facing off against #7 seeded German Angelique Kerber, and giant killers Johanna Konta of Great Britain and qualifier Zhang Shuhai of China in the other quarterfinal.

The winners will face off in the semis to determine who that finalist will be.

TransGriot Update: The other semi will be Angelique Kerber and Johanna Konta.

2016 Williams Watch-Serena's Headed To The Quarters!

While I was in Chicago dealing with a drama filled Creating Change conference, I was comforted in the fact that Serena Williams was kicking butt and taking names on her way to hopefully her seventh Australian Open title and 22nd Grand Slam title overall.

In her Australian Open third round match she played during the January 22 night session at Rod Laver Arena, she made quick 6-1, 6-1 straight set work of Russia's Daria Kasatkina.

Two days later on that Rod Laver Arena court she only took 55 minutes to efficiently send another Russian to the sidelines in Margarita Gasparyan.    Little Sis beat her in straight sets 6-2, 6-1 to set up a quarterfinal match with an opponent she hasn't lost to since the 2004 Wimbledon finals in Maria Sharapova.

Maria may be tired of hearing about it, but facts are facts.  You've lost 17 straight matches to the greatest tennis player of all time, and until you beat her, you'll get repeatedly reminded of it.

Should Serena handle her tennis business and make it 18 straight against Sharapova, she would face the winner of the Agnieszka Radwanska - Carla Suarez Navarro match in the Australian Open semifinals.

2016 Williams Watch- Good And Bad News From Melbourne

My fave tennis playing siblings are once again starting the New Year Down Under at the first Grand Slam tournament of the 2016 tennis season in the Australian Open.

And after the first round matches were completed in Melbourne, there's some good news and bad news to report.

First the bad news.  There were 12 players in the women's singles bracket that went down in first round upsets.  Number 2 seed Simona Halep, #16 seed Caroline Wozniacki, #17 Sara Errani, #22 Andrea Petkovic, #24 Sloane Stephens and #25 Samantha Stosur were some of the folks who went down in the first round.   #23 seed Svetlana Kuznetsova went bye bye in the second round.

Joining that list of one round and done players was Venus Williams.   8th seeded Big Sis is surprisingly done for this tournament after she was upset by Johanna Konta of Great Britain in straight sets 4-6, 2-6.   Venus has a great 2015 in which she reached the quarterfinals at last year's Australian Open and Wimbledon, and the third round of the US Open but had a bad day at the office at the worst possible time.  

Nothing in her game was working, including her usually lethal serve which was broken by Konta five times.  She was moved around the court easily in a loss that was considered a shock to tennis pundits

But she's out of the 2016 Aussie Open in the first round

Meanwhile on that same Rod Laver Arena court, Serena began the quest for her seventh Australian Open title by knocking off Camila Giorgi of Italy in straight sets 6-4, 7-5 to punch her ticket to the second round where she faced Hsieh Sui-Wei of Taiwan.

She took an hour to cruise to a 6-1, 6-2 straight set victory and move on to her third round match with Russia's Daria Kasatkina .

Going to be an interesting week Down Under, especially on the women's side.

2016 Williams Watch- It's Time For The Australian Open

The first Grand Slam tournament of the tennis season is the Australian Open, and the 2016 edition of it will kick off in Melbourne later tonight (Monday Melbourne time) and run until January 30.  

All eyes as usual will be on defending women's singles champ Serena Williams after her bid for a Grand Slam came up just short after being upset in the US Open semis.  She's had four months to rest from it, but there is some concern after she withdrew from the Hopman Cup warmup tournament with a knee injury.

She says she's ready to play, and she'll need to be from the opening round.  Her draw for this tournament has the world and Australian Open's number one seeded player on a potential collision course with Caroline Wozniacki (16), Belinda Bencic (12), Agnieszka Radwanska (4) and Australia Open finalist Maria Sharapova (5) in her half of the women's singles bracket.

Serena starts her bid for her 22nd Grand Slam title and seventh Australian Open title with her opening round match with Italy's Camila Giorgi, who is ranked number 35 in the world..

Well, at least they don't have Venus on the same side of the bracket with her little sister this time.

Big Sis came on strong at the end of the season and finished ranked in the top ten.  She starts 2016 with her highest seeding in a Grand Slam tournament since 2011.

Venus is seeded number 8 in this Australian Open tournament, and kicks off her quest for her first Australian Open title since 2003 with an opening round match against Johanna Konta of Great Britain.

This tournament will be interesting for both sisters, and we'll see if this is the first step to a Golden Slam for Serena or Venus executes another deep run that ends up with her clashing with her sister in a Grand Slam final.
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Y'all Still Hatin' On Serena

Was happy to find out that Sports Illustrated chose Serena Williams as their 2015 Sportsperson of the Year, and deservedly so.

When you come within two sets of accomplishing a tennis feat that hasn't been successfully completed since 1988, you dominated your sport so thoroughly at age 34 that the biggest news in it was you losing in the US Open semis,yeah, you deserve it.

But there are some folks out there, starting with the LA Times who were hatin' on my fave tennis playing sibling and showed their racist  behinds by disrespectfully running a poll comparing her with a horse.and transmisogynist horse racing fans showing their asses on Twitter.

Bet you wouldn't do the same thing to Maria Sharapova, who BTW, wishes she had 1/10th of Serena's talent along with the rest of the European glamazons she routinely beats on the WTA tour.

This ongoing racist and trans misogynistic hatred of her unapologetically Black self is why I and the rest of Black America love her and gleefully celebrate Serena's Grand Slam wins and mourn when she loses in Grand Slam tournaments.


And I and Black America are tired of you vanillacentric privileged haters attacking her femininity.

And with the 2016 tennis schedule about to kick off with the first Grand Slam tournament of the year being the Australian Open from January 18-31, frankly I'm hoping Serena uses it as a springboard to accomplishing the Golden Slam in 2016.

What's the Golden Slam?   Winning all four tennis majors plus the Olympic singles gold medal in a calendar year, which is what Steffi Graf accomplished in 1988.

And speaking of Graf, with one more Grand tournament win, she ties Steffi for all time Grand Slam tournament wins, and Margaret Court's 24 wins are in striking range of Serena this upcoming season as well.

Go Serena!  See y'all haters in Melbourne next month for the Australian Open.

2015 Williams Watch-Four Sets To History!

The US Open women's semifinals that were supposed to be played yesterday got rained out, so they were rescheduled for today and will be set up as a single daytime session.

It will start at 10 AM CDT with the match between number two seeded Simona Halep of Romania and one of the two Italian women left in the draw in Flavia Pannetta.

They are playing for their first trip to the US Open final.

Immediately following that match will be the highly anticipated one between the tournament number one seed Serena Williams and Italy's Roberta Vinci.  As you TransGriot readers know, Little Sis is just four sets and two match wins away from completing the first calendar year Grand Slam since 1988 and capturing her 22nd career grand slam title.

Serena is 4-0 against Vinci, but as NFL analyst Herman Edwards has famously said, "That's why you play the games."  But you have to believe that based on her performance against Big Sis Wednesday night, if Serena is playing at her  A++ level, they may as well start engraving the trophy with her name on it now.

We'll see in a few hours how this shakes out.

2015 Williams Watch-Serena To The Semis!

For the 14th time in a Grand Slam tournament, the first time at the US Open since 2008, and the 27th time in their careers   But this prime time quarterfinal match had high stakes with a semifinal berth on the line.

Serena's pursuit of her fourth consecutive US Open singles title and the first calendar year Grand Slam since 1988 was on the line,  Venus was working on trying to win her third US Open title and her first since 2001 when she beat Little Sis in the final to get it.

The match started with both sisters hitting hard, hitting winners and staying on serve until Serena gets the break she needed to go up 4-3 and close out the first set in 33 minutes.

Then it was Big Sis's turn to up her game as Serena suffered through a stretch of bad play that allowed Venus to close out the second set and even the match.

Then Serena as she has done all season reset, kicked her game up to A++ level and quickly reeled off three straight wins to seize control of the decisive third set and close out this emotional win with her 12th ace of the match to punch her ticket to the semifinals.

6-2, 1-6, 6-3  Five match wins down, two to go.

Her semifinal victim opponent will be Italy's Roberta Vinci who has been on the short end of her matches with Serena, having lost to her four times/

Don't think Thursday will be any different, but that's why you play the game..

TransGriot Update:  The Thursday women's semifinal matches got rained out, so they were rescheduled for Friday.

Gatorade Commercial With Prophetic Young Serena Statement

An interesting Gatorade commercial  has been airing in which a young Serena Williams is being interviewed by a reporter who asks her an interesting question

"If you were a tennis player, who would you want to be like?"

The commercial when shows video from different points of her amazing career before it cuts back to young Serena giving her answer to the reporter's question.

Check out the video...

2015 Williams Watch- Which Sister Made It To The US Open Quarterfinals?

Today Venus and Serena were on the Arthur Ashe Stadium courts playing their fourth round US Open matches with quarterfinal berths at stake.

Which sister made it to the quarterfinals?   Both of them.

23rd seeded Venus got this Sunday afternoon of tennis at Arthur Ashe Stadium off to a great start with a dominating performance against Estonian qualifier Anett Kontaveit, who was playing in her first US Open and got to the fourth round after beating Madison Brengle in three sets

Big Sis took only 50 minutes to efficiently punch her ticket to the quarters with a 6-2, 6-1 straight set victory over Kontaveit and set up her first trip to the US Open quarters since 2010.

The question then became who would Venus play in that quarterfinal?

Serena took the Arthur Ashe court moments later for what was expected to be by tennis pundits the tougher match of the afternoon against 19th seeded Madison Keys.  

Serena faced and beat Keys earlier this year in the Australian Open semifinals, and wasn't playing with the tennis youngling.   Little Sis was on her A++ game from the outset, but the 20 year old Keys was hanging with her booming serve for booming serve and shot for shot as both stayed on serve .

Serena got a critical service break thanks to Keys double faults and unforced errors to put her up 5-3 and allow her to close the first set on her racquet.

The second set was just as close, with both players staying on serve and amazing shots being hit until once again Keys got broken to put Little Sis up 4-3. Serena held serve to push the lead up to 5-3, and when Keys needed to come up with the clutch serve to save match point,  she double faulted to hand little Sis a 6-3, 6-3 straight set victory that took only 68 minutes to complete.

Four down, only three more match wins to tennis history    But that next match will be against her big sister.

At 7 PM EDT on Tuesday night, we should have a sold out Arthur Ashe Stadium and a huge television audience watching the first US Open quarterfinal between the Williams Sisters at Flushing Meadow since 2008 with huge stakes for both sisters.

Venus is playing for her third US Open title, Serena for the first calendar year Grand Slam since 1998.  Which sister will prevail?.


 

2015 Williams Watch- On To The US Open Fourth Round

The Williams Sisters so far successful business trip to Flushing Meadow for the US Open continued into the third round, but this time the sisters days were reversed.   While 23rd seeded Venus breezed to a straight set 6-3, 6-4 win against Switzerland's Belinda Bencic, the evening session for number one seeded Serena didn't quite go as planned for her against fellow American Bethanie Mattek-Sands.

Let's talk about Big Sis for a moment.   She advanced to the fourth round of the US Open for the first time since 2010 by knocking off the 12th seeded Bencic.   She will play qualifier Anett Kontaveit of Estonia who knocked off American Madison Brengle in three sets to get to the fourth round.


Serena's run to tennis history and the US Open fourpeat ran into trouble in her match with Mattek-Sands.  While she came out flat in the first set, spraying 14 unforced errors to just one for her opponent, Mattek-Sands was on her A game to the point that Serena dropped her first set at the US Open to another American since 2005.

Last American to take a first set from Serena at the US Open?   Her big sister Venus.  

But Serena dropping the first set in a Grand Slam has been a recurring theme this year, but she has managed to summon that refuse to lose will, up the level of her game and escape with the win eight times.

But Mattek-Sands kept up the pressure, coming within two games of springing the upset for the ages before Serena found the A++ tennis level that many people can't match and won eight straight games to take the match 3-6.7-5, 6-0.

Serena's next opponent will be Madison Keys, who she vanquished in the Australian Open semis earlier this year.   Keys got past Agnieszka Radwanska in straight sets to earn another shot at the world's number one player.  

Should Serena and Venus get past their fourth round opposition on Sunday, they will face each other in the US Open quarterfinals.

2015 Williams Watch-On To The US Open Third Round

The world is watching the US Open to see if Serena Williams can win her fourth straight title and in the process, complete the first calendar year Grand Slam since 1988.  

One of the things we Serena fans know and worry about is that if she's going to get upset, it's going to happen early in the first week.  Once she gets zoned in and gets over her early round nervousness, she's tough to stop.

And in a US Open tournament that has seen ten seeded players exit the tournament in the first round, another in Russia's Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova get beat in straight sets in the second round, and Maria Sharapova withdraw before the tournament even started because of a leg injury, Little Sis as the world's number one ranked player and number one tournament seed is a prohibitive favorite to capture this final grand Slam tournament of the season.

Serena's opponent in this second round match at Arthur Ashe Stadium was Kiki Bertens of the Netherlands, and in the first set Bertens gave an admittedly nervous Serena a stiff challenge that belied her number 110 world ranking.

Bertens promptly broke Serena's serve, and was serving for the set at 5-4 before Serena came back to force a tiebreaker.  Unfazed, the 23 year old Bertens sprinted to a 4-0 lead in the tiebreaker before Serena showed that heart of a champion once again,  She rallied to tie it at 4-4 with some self destructive help from Bertens, and eventually won  to steal the first set.

After that first set escape in which she had eight double faults, Serena took command of the match when she broke Bertens for a 3-2 lead and closed it out for the 7-6 (7-5) 6-3 straight set win.  

Two match wins down, five to go for the calendar year Grand Slam.

Next up for Serena will be Bethanie Mattek-Sands, who knocked off Coco Vandeweghe in straight sets after she upset Sloane Stephens in the first round.  In case you're wondering what Serena's record is against Mattek-Sands this year:  2-0

Meanwhile, Venus was playing fellow American Irina Falconi under the Arthur Ashe Stadium lights , and it looked like Big Sis was going to romp to victory in straight sets.   But that disturbing tendency of Venus not closing out matches reared its ugly head again.   Up 5-3 and serving for the match, it started going  sideways for Big Sis as Falconi raised her game up another level, and broke Venus' serve twice to force a tiebreaker, then kept her momentum going to take the second set.

The reason for the up and down performance?  35 winners offset by 47 unforced errors for Big Sis. She recorded six aces against five double faults.

Big Sis regrouped, got off to a fast start and rolled to a 4-1 lead before Falconi recovered to close to 4-2.  After holding serve, she broke Falconi one last time to close out the match and get a hard fought 6-3. 6-7 (2-7) 6-2 win and punch her ticket to the third round.        

She will face Switzerland's Belinda Bencic, the 18 year old protege of Martina Hingis who was nearly ousted from the tournament by Misaki Doi of Japan in a drama filled three set match    Venus will attempt to get past the third round of the US Open for the first time since 2010.

But the question is will the oldest player in the tournament field (35), have enough to get past the precocious 12th seeded Bencic, and get one step closer to a possible quarterfinal match with her sister for the second straight Grand Slam tournament?

And will Serena keep rolling to tennis history? 

2015 Williams Watch- On To The US Open Second Round

The first day of the US Open was a successful one for both Serena and Venus Williams as they handled their tennis business and got past their respective opponents to the second round.

number on seeded Serena kicked off the night session at Arthur Ashe Stadium by winning the first eight games of her match with Vitalia Diatchenko before the Russian retired due to injury 30 minutes later.  

6-0, 2-0 was the score at the time of her opponent's retirement, and Little Sis is now six more match wins away from tennis history and her seventh US Open title as she heads to the second round in an unexpected way.

Serena's opponent will be the Netherlands Kiki Bertens   If Serena handles her second round match business she would face the winner of the Bethanie Mattek-Sands - Coco Vandeweghe match.

23rd seeded Venus' day started a little earlier on the Arthur Ashe stadium courts as she faced Monica Puig of Puerto Rico.   She ended up in a three set slugfest with Puig, who fought off four match points to extend the match into a deciding third set before Venus turned it up another notch to get the 6-4, 6-7 (7-9) 6-3 win

Big Sis is trying to capture her third US Open title and her first since she beat Serena in straight sets in 2001 to get it.  Venus will face in the second round Irina Falconi, and should she get past her would face the winner of the Belinda Bencic- Misaki Doi match

It's possible that if both sisters keep winning in their sections of the draw, they would meet in the US Open quarterfinals.

Will be watching my fave tennis playing siblings to see how things progress at Flushing Meadow.

2015 Williams Watch- All Eyes On Serena

The 135th edition of the US Open kicks off today and runs through September 13, and there's something new for this event.   As part of a $500 million renovation,  a roof is being constructed that will cover Arthur Ashe Stadium that is scheduled for completion in time for next year's open.

That's the future along with a planned roof for Louis Armstrong Stadium and a 8000 seat Grandstand Court, so now let's talk about the present and the historic opportunity that presents itself for her.

Serena walks onto the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center grounds in NYC as not only the world's number one ranked player and number one seed in this tournament, but a favorite to take the women's title.  Big Sis Venus is seeded 23rd.

If she does so, it will not only be her fourth straight US Open title, but her fifth straight Grand Slam and as every tennis fan on the planet knows, her first calendar year Grand Slam.  And oh yeah, she would tie Steffi Graf with 22 career Grand Slam tournament titles.

But the road to tennis history starts with this first round match against Vitalia Diatchenko while Venus faces off against Puerto Rico's Monica Puig.