Venus Williams rolls back years for impressive first round ASB Classic win

Venus Williams showed she’s still got it at the age of 42, with a first round win over tricky American Katie Volynet at the ASB Classic on Monday night.

The veteran of all veterans beat the 21-year-old 7-6 6-2 in her first appearance in a tennis match since last year’s US Open.

Given how little Williams plays on the circuit these days, it was stunning how well she played, as she sent out a message that it’s still too early to contemplate retirement, even though this is her first tournament since her younger sister, Serena, did just that.

“I haven’t played a lot, in years! So it’s never easy to walk out there,” Williams said of her win.

READ MORE:
* Leylah Fernandez felt like old timer in crushing win over Brenda Fruhvirtova at ASB Classic
* ASB Classic: Meet the seeds for this year’s women’s tournament
* ASB Classic’s Leylah Fernandez glad to be a small part of tennis history

“I know I’m playing well, but getting into a match is a completely different story.

“It was a tough match today, she got so many balls back and it just felt good to be able to play well against an opponent who’s on the rise.”

Williams scrambled superbly on defence and it was clear Volynet’s game plan was to move her around as much as possible. But constantly Williams was able to get the ball back and deep, while she ripped numerous incredible winners with her backhand.

“I did my best to put some time in on the court after the US Open, so that goes for something,” Williams said.

“But like I said, I’ve probably played some of the least matches on the WTA Tour.

“So I knew going out there it wasn’t going to be an easy task for me, mentally, physically, or anything.

“But what I need is to win some matches, get out there and get more and more comfortable. So it’s nice to see that some things were still firing.”

The biggest cheer of the entire day came when Williams walked down the stairs and onto Centre Court.

The sold out crowd knew there was chance this could be the last time they’d ever get to see one of the most iconic players in the sport and even though at her age she’s obviously not the player she once was, most tennis fans wouldn’t miss the chance to see her play.

Ranked 1003 in the world, Williams hadn’t won a match since she defeated Mihaela Buzarenescu in the first round of last year’s Wimbledon.

This was Williams’s first match since the US Open in late August and she was only playing in Auckland because she had been given a wildcard for the Australian Open in a couple of weeks.

So no one really knew how Williams would play in this match against Volynets, the 21-year-old, ranked 113 in the world.

Even Williams wasn’t quite sure how she was able to play so well.

“I don’t know, it’s not easy,” she said.

“It’s definitely a mental battle when you don’t have the match reps. I’ve had a different circumstance with a lot of injuries and no match reps for a few years and that’s really hard.

“But I know that I can do it and it’s just a matter of putting it together. So if I can keep playing matches I’ll have a chance.”

Early on it became apparent that the outcome of this match would be determined by Williams. She had too much power for Volynets to handle, but the question was would Williams be able to keep enough balls in the court, or there would be too many errors.

There was a break to each player in the first set and Volynets was up 2-1 in the tiebreak when rain fell, taking the players off court for almost an hour.

When they came back Williams played some of her best tennis, taking the tiebreak 7-4 and then breaking her compatriot in the first game of the second set.

Williams went up 3-0 two games later finally managing to convert the sixth break point she had and against a player of Williams’s mental strength there was no way back for Volynets from there.

In the second round on either Wednesday or Thursday will play against Zhu Lin, who defeated No 8 seed Madison Brengle earlier on Monday.

Meanwhile, New Zealand’s Erin Routliffe and her American Partner Caroline Dolehide, who were the top seeds, lost 7-5 6-4 to Catherine Harrison from America and Mexico’s Fernanda Contreras Gomez 7-5 6-4.