Serena completes unlikely comeback

WIMBLEDON, England -- Even at the age of 30, with a two-year gap since her last Grand Slam title and a long list of recent health problems, Serena Williams is hoping she's just getting started on something big.

Williams won her fifth Wimbledon title on Saturday -- and 14th Grand Slam overall -- to mark the culmination of an improbable comeback. With her health restored and her game back at its best, she's not planning on slowing down anytime soon.

"It's the beginning of a great phase," Williams said after beating Agnieszka Radwanska 6-1, 5-7, 6-2 on Centre Court. "I feel amazing out there. This whole tournament I felt really great physically. So it's definitely the beginning of something great. I hope it is."

Williams certainly looked great on Saturday, bossing Radwanska around the court for large stretches of the first and last set. She had a brief lapse in the second, tightening up as the most prestigious trophy in tennis was once again within her reach.

"Maybe I wanted it so bad that I got tight," she said. "Instead of focusing on things that I was doing I was only focusing on things that I wasn't doing."

At least these days she's focusing on tennis again.

Williams was sidelined for 10 months following her last Wimbledon title in 2010. A few days after that victory, she cut both feet on broken glass while leaving a restaurant in Germany and needed two operations. Then, it was blood clots in her lungs, which led to her being hospitalized and eventually needing another procedure.

With all those problems, many doubted she'd ever get back to the top. For a while, Williams doubted whether she'd ever be back on the court.

"I didn't think I would play tennis again at one point, I just wanted to make it out of the hospital," she said. "And I wasn't even thinking about tennis. I was just thinking about my family, and thinking about just making it out of that moment. That's when you realize you have perspectives about life."

Over the last two weeks at Wimbledon, it often looked like she'd never been gone at all.

She broke her own tournament record for aces in a match with 23 against Zheng Jie in the third round. Less than a week later, she eclipsed that mark with 24 against Azarenka in the semifinals. In between, she ousted defending champion Petra Kvitova in straight sets in the quarter-finals.

-- The Associated Press

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition July 9, 2012 C4