TRACY AUSTIN: Venus Williams is must-watch star on Monday at Wimbledon

Venus Williams against Elina Svitolina is well deserving of a Centre Court billing on Monday despite the pair being in the tournament thanks to wildcards. Williams’ story is just remarkable. 

When she made her debut here in 1997, this year’s favourite Iga Swiatek wasn’t even born. But now 43 and after so many injuries in the last year or so, the American is still out there looking so fired up. Ukrainian Svitolina got to the semis four years ago and had a great run in Paris last month. 

She also won in Strasbourg in May on her return from giving birth to daughter Skai alongside husband Gael Monfils. The Wimbledon crowd will have so much respect for these two. 

Venus has elegance on court and said one of her biggest achievements in the game is fighting for equal prize money for women and men. 

It’s fantastic that she still enjoys playing and competing and we saw the great match against Camila Giorgi in Birmingham last month — she still has the ambition to dig deep in great long matches. The fact they are playing each other is special. 

It’s the best first-round match. Coco Gauff against Sofia Kenin will be exciting, too. 

Also watch out for young Russian Mirra Andreeva, the 16-year-old who had a funny exchange with Andy Murray last month in which she called him ‘beautiful’ and he replied ‘imagine how good she will be at tennis when her eyes are fixed!’ 

HOW ARE THE BIG THREE WOMEN LOOKING? 

It is extremely difficult to pick a winner from the women’s side of the draw this year. To underline that, just look at the difference with the men’s draw, where Novak Djokovic is the runaway favourite to win. 

The Serb has not lost a match at Wimbledon since 2017, won the last four titles at SW19 and has taken the first two Grand Slams this year, so is the clear pick to win again despite Carlos Alcaraz winning at Queen’s this month and being the top seed. 

On the women’s side, though, it is extremely hard to choose. In the past it has been hard to look past Ash Barty, who retired last year aged 26 having conquered the sport, or Serena Williams. 

Now we have the so-called ‘big three’ of women’s tennis and you can make a case for all of them but none are clear favourites, and there are many outside picks that could win the title. 

The last six championships have been won by six different women — will there be a seventh? The draw favours world No 1 Swiatek, who has won four Grand Slams — three at Roland Garros and one US Open — but is yet to conquer grass at the top level after winning the juniors event here as a 17-year-old in 2018. 

She likes the clay courts where her big forehand and take-back allows her time to set up, clobber the ball and hit heavy spin. 

The grass does not allow you time on the forehand and Alize Cornet broke that down in beating her here last year. Iga and her team, led by coach Tomasz Wiktorowski, will understand the challenges and she looked good this week at Bad Homburg, where she shortened up the swing and became more aggressive before pulling out with an illness ahead of the semi-final. 

So it’s intriguing how Iga manages and adapts her game. She plays China’s Lin Zhu today, who is a very good player — but the draw should give Swiatek time to build her game. 

Aryna Sabalenka is the world No 2 and the Belarusian has gained huge belief from winning the Australian Open in January, though there might be some mental scars from losing the semi-final at Roland Garros despite being in a commanding position. 

The 25-year-old does not have a lot of grass-court tune -up matches, which are crucial on this surface. She will aim to improve on her run to the 2021 semi-finals here. 

Defending champion Elena Rybakina has proven she knows how to win here but has seen her grass-court season wrecked by illness, a problem which started in Paris when she withdrew from the French Open on the middle weekend with a virus.

There’s definitely an impact when you’re ill. Most feel more comfortable having matchplay on this unique surface but Rybakina does seem to have a calm mentality.

WHO ELSE CAN WIN HERE, THEN? 

Coco Gauff has had a couple of nice runs at Wimbledon and is improving her forehand, which is her tipping-point shot. The American teenager has a tricky first-round draw against Kenin, who won the Australian Open in 2020 but had to qualify after injury and a hiatus last year. 

But Gauff beat compatriot Jessica Pegula, No 4 in the world, at Eastbourne last week and got to the semi-finals, which is a great warm-up for Wimbledon. Donna Vekic, coached by Pam Shriver, has had great grass-court results not just this year but over the years, and her game has elevated on the surface. 

Last year’s finalist Ons Jabeur, who we can’t go without mentioning, has had a tepid grass-court year but can she get hot with all the good memories here? Beatriz Haddad Maia and Jelena Ostapenko, who won at Birmingham, are also dangerous on this surface. 

Maria Sakkari and Eastbourne winner Madison Keys could meet in the third round and that could be a huge clash. There’s also French Open finalist Karolina Muchova and two-time winner Petra Kvitova. If you walk in the gates of a Grand Slam ground as a winner, your confidence already rises as you have so many good memories. 

MOVING FROM CLAY TO GRASS 

Playing Wimbledon is like sitting an exam after a crash course revision programme. There is barely any time between the clay and the grass swings. Most players play one or two tournaments to get comfortable with the movement on grass as it is so different. 

But the match count can be so low. You have to convince yourself your game is good on the surface even when it might not be so fine-tuned yet. 

Players need time to rest and there are only three weeks between two majors — it’s a very quick reset. This is the biggest transition. 

The slow red clay to low-bouncing quick grass. Djokovic has mastered the transition but not many have done so. If you go deep at Roland Garros, there really is very little time to have a needed rest and then get ready for Wimbledon. 

That’s why Wimbledon is so hard to predict. Going into the French Open, we have six weeks of clay-court data to judge players’ form, how they have played and how deep they have gone in tournaments. It makes for a fascinating fortnight.