This is all a little high-school confidential-ish, I know, but I go into it for two reasons. First, because all this yelling and fist-pumping gets tiresome. Second and more important, it’s just one of the many ways Sharapova gives herself away in a manner that would make a serious student of body language cringe. At other points in the match, she was unable to hide her disappointment at missing one of the scant opportunities she did have. After the error, she allowed her arms to drop and her shoulders to droop. She obviously felt deflated. Surely someone with as much pride as Sharapova knows better, so take it as a sign of just how demoralizing it is to face Williams and that blizzard of aces and winners that regularly pour from her racquet.
The dynamic when these two women meet is intriguing. Usually, Sharapova is the aggressor. Unlike Williams, she won’t even utter a “sorry” when she takes back a serve toss. She also ratchets up the already deafening shriek that accompanies every shot (Williams was utterly silent through the first few games, but apparently couldn’t resist challenging her rival in the yelling competition), and throws in all those fist pumps.
By contrast, Williams embarks on the test with something that looks very much like disdain. She moves extra slowly, almost reluctantly — as if she doesn’t take her task all that seriously. Of course, that’s not true, and some of it can be put down to anxiety. As she would say later, “I was so nervous today. I’m usually not this nervous before a match. I was not myself this match at all. But I’m glad I got through that one because I’ve played nervous before and I’ve lost a few times. I was really happy to win this one.”
That might be difficult to swallow, and let’s remember that Williams’s diplomatic skills have improved noticeably. She was more convincing when she said that she also felt a lot of anxiety coming into the tournament. “I think in the back of my head, yes. I mean I played great last year, too. I won the same tournaments. And I was like. . . I just want to win one match here. If I can just win one match, if I can get a good first round, good second round, if I could get through these I felt like I could do a lot better. I actually got a little bit tight in my first-round match, even though I won oh and one or something like that. I just got tight and I told my mom afterwards, ‘I can’t do this anymore. I’m too old for this! Like I mean, I’ve got to find a solution.’ We talked about it and I got over it.”
It often takes a little time for Williams to get fully invested in a match, and when she did it spelled doom for Sharapova. That moment of commitment seemed to come in that third game, and Williams followed the break with a strong hold and another break that put her up 4-2.
Sharapova did well to hold the next game, and a ray of light broke over her landscape when she broke Serena to level it at 4-all. But Sharapova couldn’t hold serve as Williams won two rallies and secured the break with massive cross-court forehand blast.
Williams held to win the set, but Sharapova got a nice little boost out of holding the first game of the second, in which Williams had five break points. But one easy Williams hold later, Sharapova was in trouble again — and this time she wouldn’t escape.
Up to this point, Sharapova had endured familiar, harrowing adventures each time she served the ball. But for a change she put in her first serve — no let, no caught-toss dry run, no dodgy call and do-over — and Williams returned it. Caught off guard, perhaps, but such a routine exchange, Sharapova mangled a forehand to give Williams a 2-1 lead.
Suddenly, Williams began to put on a powerful serving demonstration. She also smoothed
