2009 SUMMARY
Titles Won: Australian Open, Wimbledon
Best Grand Slam Result: As above
Win/Loss Record: 45-12
Record Against Top 10: 9-5
SEC History: Making sixth appearance (nine qualifications); champion in 2001
Williams' Sony Ericsson WTA Tour bio
Was justice done when Serena Williams took back the No.1 ranking from Dinara Safina earlier this month? In the minds of some, not least Serena herself, yes. This week she is back at No.2 but Serena has demonstrated, perhaps more than any other player, her ability to rise to the big occasion. The Sony Ericsson Championships will give her a perfect platform to strut her stuff, and assuming her body holds up, there's no reason to believe she won't.
Ever since she reached the final at Wimbledon last year Serena has been the supreme performer at the Grand Slams: if only she'd done better at Roland Garros in June she might have secured another 'Serena Slam'. First there was a third US Open title in 2008, then victory over Safina at the Australian Open in January, and over her sister Venus at Wimbledon. And it's worth remembering her quarterfinal loss to eventual French Open champion Svetlana Kuznetsova was desperately tight.
But 11-time Grand Slam champion Serena's problem is the opposite of Safina's: she doesn't deliver in quite the same way at regular Sony Ericsson WTA Tour events. Or so the theory goes. True, the American didn't win a title outside the majors this year, but aside from a dismal three-tournament stretch on clay at Marbella, Rome and Madrid, she was actually rather consistent.
Photo Gallery: Williams' 2009 season
Serena's best non-Slam effort was at Miami, where she beat Venus in a three-set semi but was flat against Victoria Azarenka in the championship match. She also reached four Premier-level semifinals - at Sydney, Paris [Indoors], Dubai and Toronto - succumbing to Elena Dementieva twice and Venus once. There was no shame in her quarterfinal loss to a surging No.20 Samantha Stosur at Stanford; Austrian lefty Sybille Bammer got the better of her in the round of 16 at Cincinnati, while in her most recent outing she fell to Nadia Petrova in a third set tie-break in the round of 16 at Beijing.
In any case, Serena arrives in Doha with a win-loss record of 45-12, and a 9-5 head-to-head against the Top 10. (On that front, no one else comes close.) Not counting a retirement, nor her out-of-sorts semifinal loss to Kim Clijsters at Flushing Meadows, Serena lost just once to a player outside the Top 30 (95th-ranked Klara Zakopalova in the first round at Marbella). She was also a protagonist in what is widely regarded as the match of the season, against Dementieva in the Wimbledon semis. Notable, too, is the great year Serena and Venus have had in doubles, winning three of the four majors, as well as Stanford. In Doha they make their first SEC appearance as a team.
Serena's sole SEC title was won back in 2001, when the thrill of clinching the final point was absent because Lindsay Davenport was unable to contest the final. As long as she does better than Safina this week she'll also secure the year-end No.1 spot for the second time, making victory doubly sweet.
Features: Serena's Revealing BBC Interview Off-Court: Seeing Double Serena
