Katelyn Caniford | Towpath Tennis Pro
 |
| Rolling Stone |
The story could not have been written better. One of America’s
favorite sibling athlete-duos squaring up against each other in the
quarter-finals of the biggest tennis tournaments in the country, the US Open.
On Tuesday September 8th, 2015, Venus and Serena Williams
faced off against each other for the 27th time
at Arthur Ashe Stadium in NYC. After 98 minutes of back and forth tennis
culminating in a somewhat close third set, Serena took the victory 6-2, 1-6,
6-3 to put her just two matches short of not only winning the US Open, but also
achieving a calendar-year Grand Slam. If Serena wins her next few matches, she
will become one of only a few women to ever win all four major singles titles
in a season.
The importance
of this tournament for Serena is huge--so huge in fact that one
might ask the question as to whether or not this match, or at least some parts of
it, could have potentially been predetermined. Now I will say that I’m a fan of
both of the Williams sisters and think that they are two of the greatest
women’s players of all time, however, after witnessing their match Tuesday
night I had a hard time believing that 100% of everything that I was watching
was not staged in some sense. From the over the top reactions from Serena, to
the absolute dominance of Venus in the second set, I think there might have
been some talks between the two beforehand as to how they wanted their match to
go. It was so tightly contested that it almost seemed too good to be true.
Serena dominating the first, Venus dominating the second, and then Venus
creeping up slightly near the end of the third--it was textbook perfection! Not
to mention, I’m sure that Venus absolutely would not have wanted to be the one
to take away her sister’s chance of becoming one of the few women to ever
achieve all four Major singles wins in a season.
To
me, what seemed like a dead giveaway to what was potentially going on were the
strong reactions from Serena when she would miss her shots. Don’t get me wrong,
I tend to react strongly when I’m not playing well too, but it almost seemed
that in this match she was forcing herself to react that way for drama-sake.
And then to do so against her sister of all people? It’s almost like she had to
tell herself to freak out for the crowd.
This
then made me think of what other majoring sporting events that have possibly
been predetermined beforehand, because it’s no shocker it’s been done before (Hellooo
2014’s World Cup, 2002’s NBA Playoff scandal, or the WWE!) Now granted, I'm not
undermining professional athletes or the hard work they put into their sport,
but I do think that when it comes to “Cinderella stories” or huge moments in
the world of sports (or whatever will draw big ratings), there is a possibility
that some, if not all, parts of them are predetermined or at
least discussed beforehand by the participants/officials. Who knows, maybe this
is just all speculation but I am curious to hear thoughts from others about
this match, as well as thoughts on the potential of fixed results in all sports
today.
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