While the Williams sisters are in the midst of a long, slow decline, they still form a certain benchmark of quality among the women. If you can drive the ball past the sisters and successfully take the match to them, rather than waiting for their errors, you’re a player. Women who can do that on a regular basis don’t come along often, but they tend to stay at the top of the game. Kim Clijsters, Justine Henin-Hardenne, Lindsay Davenport, Maria Sharapova, and, on occasion, the other top Russians are pretty much it this decade. Now you can add one more to the list: 17-year-old Nicole Vaidisova of the Czech Republic-via-Bradenton, Fla.
Of course, you might say that all Vaidisova had to do was wait for Venus to miss today. The elder Williams made 70 mistakes, more than enough to give away two sets. And there’s no doubt the match was the epitome of hit-and-miss tennis—Vaidisova made 57 errors of her own. The two women traded line drives for three sets, rifling one ball into the corner, spraying the next 5 feet long, drilling the third into the middle of the net. But Vaidisova never resorted to pushing; she kept going for her shots, at times to a fault. She didn’t have much choice, to be honest. Today neither woman could put five shots in a row into the court.
Still, Venus didn’t give this one away. The key was Vaidisova’s ability to force the action. It didn’t take long for Venus to get the message that the teenager, whom she had beaten easily last year in their only meeting, wouldn’t be bullied. In the first game, Vaidisova hit a hard forehand near the middle of the court. The ball didn’t land too far from Williams, who’s one of the game’s all-time great scramblers and who takes pride in chasing down everything. But this one was by her in the blink of an eye. Venus, normally expressionless, pursed her lips and nodded slightly, a tiny sign of respect that she echoed in her press conference afterward. “She just played really good tennis,” Williams said. “She was just the better player today.” When was the last time you heard THAT from one of the Williamses?
Vaidisova started nervously, double-faulting three times in her first service game, but she went up 4-1 anyway by robbing Venus of time with her ground strokes. The match followed the same pattern as Vaidisova’s last win, over Amelie Mauresmo. The Czech lost tight first-set tiebreakers in both, then cruised. It’s as if she had to learn to believe she could win as she went along. Williams in particular must be a legendary figure to her. Vaidisova was 8 when Venus played her first U.S. Open final, in 1997, and she used Williams’ signature racquet growing up.
The upshot: We’ve got another tall, Eastern-bloc blonde basher on our hands. And she’s followed the Sharapova script to a T: Vaidisova’s stepfather, Alex Kodat, brought his family to Bollettieri’s from Prague when Nicole was 11.
So how does she compare to the Russian? Vaidisova is smoother and more athletic—her mom was a gymnast—and her serve is just as strong, if perhaps a little less consistent. Vaidisova is 6-feet tall, but it doesn’t seem to adversely affect her movement or stroke production. She likes pace, of course—at 4-3 in the third, Vaidisova came up with two major down-the-line forehands under heavy pressure from Venus. But she can also volley, and even hit a drop volley or two if the stars are aligned.
On the downside, Vaidisova’s forehand grip is pretty extreme and she hits a flat ball, which makes that shot all-or-nothing much of the time. She’s also prone to going for broke on important points. At 5-6 in the first-set tiebreaker, Williams, who was having trouble with her toss, fluttered in a second serve. Rather than move forward and hit a solid, penetrating return, Vaidisova reared back and went for an inside-out forehand to the far corner of the court. She missed and lost the set. Most important, Vaidisova doesn't appear to have the laser focus of Sharapova. The Czech gets flustered and shows it.
Just as crucial as the Sharapova question is the Sharapov question: Is tennis about to get another Yuri in the form of her stepfather? Kodat may look the part—think Ion Tiriac with a gym membership (assuming he was the guy cheering in the stands today, that is)—but when I talked to him on the phone he was thoughtful and soft-spoken. Everyone at Bollettieri’s says the family, which includes Nicole’s two younger brothers, is astoundingly normal and professional. Nicole speaks three languages, having learned English from the other kids on the tennis courts in Bradenton. That may not sound like the best schooling, but listen to how well she speaks it.
Does that sound boring? Don’t worry, Vaidisova’s got a temper. I’ve heard fans refer to her as “Princess” during a loss, and the French crowd gave her an initiation against Mauresmo by booing some of her petulant behavior. When Vaidisova lost last year at the U.S. Open, she drilled a ball into the stands, nearly hitting someone. You can’t call that dull, can you? The next time you see her live, Vaidisova may literally keep you on your toes.
One problem: Her grunt. Today it sounded like an update of Elena Dementieva’s two-part squeak. Not as bad as Sharapova, but not pleasant-sounding, either.
After the first set, I was prepared to write about Venus and the potential for a miracle run similar to her win last year at Wimbledon. Too bad—she’ll be 26 in two weeks, which means she’s rapidly becoming an elder stateswoman of the tour. From there, it won’t be long before Venus becomes a beloved veteran along the lines of Connors, Seles, and Agassi—aka, someone who was disliked when they were young, cocky, and dominant, but is embraced once they have a very, very slim chance of winning. Or they get stabbed. Sports fans are stupid like that.
Why not appreciate Venus now, before the rest of the world jumps on the bandwagon? Yes, she scowls and screeches out there, but she’s also one the game’s few punks, in the good sense of the word: Someone who made it her own, unorthodox way. How many other pros—or players above level 2.5—bounce the ball when they start a warm-up rally? No athletes I’ve seen, besides her sister, walk with such a soft, aimless, splay-footed gait—and then run like hell when they need to. Despite her idiosyncrasies, Venus abides by the rules like no one else. She almost never argues a call, and she may be the only player, along with Serena, who walks straight to the other side of the court after the first game of a set, the way you’re supposed to. Shouldn’t that make tennis fans a little bit happy?
The problem is that Venus never stopped doing it her own way. She and her sister made it to No. 1 by hitting inside-out backhands (which no one did at the time and everyone from Martina Hingis to Rafael Nadal does now), standing way in to return serve, and going for the lines. Today she never backed up to return Vaidisova’s strong serve and never stopped hitting out on her fundamentally flawed forehand, and it hurt her. Her father, who was her coach when she was No. 1, still sat behind in her in the stands. Three sets later Williams had 70 errors and was out of the tournament.
At least she could see a version of her original style moving on to the semis, in the form of Vaidisova. The Czech talked about the first time she met Williams, at the 2004 U.S. Open. “I saw her in the locker room. I was very excited,” Vaidisova said. “I admired her style of game.”