Injured Venus Williams Upset In Tokyo Final

Injured Venus Williams Upset In Tokyo Final
By Ken Miller, Lawn Tennis Correspondent, Posted: Sunday, October 8, 2007 4:36am CST USA

Photo by Itsuo Inouye/AP

Tokyo--(lawntennismag.com) Venus Williams faced another injury in her Tokyo final round loss over the weekend to Virginie Razzano of France 4-6, 7-6(9-7), 6-4. Williams failed to convert three matchpoints in the tiebreaker before leaving the court to have her upper right thigh wrapped.

"My leg started bothering me in the first set and then you know it's going to hurt the whole match," said Williams.

One good point still Williams has to take away from the match is that playing Tokyo put her closer to a coveted spot at the WTA Tour's year end eight player tournament to be held the week of November 5th at Madrid, Spain.

Williams and Razzano traded sharp angles in set one before Williams held on to one break to claim the set. Halfway through set two Williams fans in America found themselves with a pleasant surprise as the Tennis Channel provided bonus television coverage of the match as it entered the allotted time for the Tokyo men's semifinals which were to be played following the women's final.

Down 1-4 Williams turned up the heat to reach the tiebreaker with a massive return game and serves so fast Razzano had to duck down to miss.

In the tiebreaker at 6-3, Williams held three matchpoints but made two groundstroke errors and watched a Razzano forehand winner pass by to make the score 6-6. More errors at 7-7 cost Williams the set as she doublefaulted and then netted a forehand to even the match at one set all.

After holding serve to start set three, Williams left the court and reappeared minutes later with her right thigh wrapped. In pain and not moving very well, Williams stood up during one changeover before falling behind 3-4.

Razzano continued to take the ball early as Williams hit a handful of final errors to end the match.

"I decided to play because I wanted to win and I have no regrets," Williams said. "But in the third set when I got up to serve I couldn't get my leg up." The match had thrilled the Tokyo crowd for a total of two hours and fourty-nine minutes.