Venus and Serena Williams are out of the US Open girls’s doubles within the first spherical after shedding 7-6 (5), 6-4 to the Czech group of Lucie Hradecka and Linda Noskova on Thursday evening earlier than one other packed crowd at Arthur Ashe Stadium.
After Hradecka slotted a backhand volley winner on match level after 2hr 5min, the introduced sellout crowd of 23,859 followers saluted the Williams sisters with a standing ovation as they congratulated their opponents on the web, hugged each other and walked off the courtroom in what is likely to be the ultimate bow for one of many sport’s most embellished partnerships.
With Serena having strongly hinted that she can be retiring after this yr’s US Open, it marked the seemingly ultimate look of the Williams-Williams group, who’ve mixed to win 14 grand slam titles (with a sterling 14-0 file in finals) together with three Olympic gold medals as a group.
“I’m still in shock that we won,” Hradecka, a two-time main doubles champion, stated to the group in an on-court interview. “I’m so sorry for you that we beat them, but we are so happy that we did it.”
Added Noskova: “Playing against the Williams sisters is a special moment for everybody, anyone and anytime.”
There was little to separate the groups throughout a tense 72min opening set. But the Williams sisters had been unable to transform a pair of break-point probabilities with Noskova serving at 4-5, then let a 5-3 benefit within the tiebreaker slip away.
After getting damaged of their opening service recreation of the second, the Williamses made one ultimate push to get again on serve earlier than the Czech duo broke clear.
It marked solely the second time the Williams sisters have misplaced within the first spherical at a grand slam and the primary in 25 years, after they bowed to the Canadian-American pair of Jill Hetherington and Kathy Rinaldi-Stunkel on the 1997 US Open, the primary main they performed collectively.
Serena will flip her give attention to solely on the singles, the place she’s going to face on Australia’s Ajla Tomljanovic within the third spherical on Friday evening.
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