Nerves and a closed roof framed Serena’s Wimbledon loss

Rennae Stubbs said Serena Williams’ nerves took time to settle during her first singles match in nearly four years at Wimbledon, and she tied part of the match’s conditions to the Centre Court roof being closed indoors. Stubbs also recounted the knee injury th

For Serena Williams, Wimbledon didn’t feel like a quick comeback.

About an hour into her first singles match in nearly four years, she took a deep breath that Rennae Stubbs noticed right away—and then, in Stubbs’ view, something clicked. Williams went on to lose 6-3, 6-7 (6), 6-3 to 20-year-old Maya Joint of Australia on Tuesday.

Stubbs, one of Williams’ coaches, pinpointed that moment as nerves easing. “I noticed in the middle of the second set her take a big sort of deep breath and I actually turned around to Venus and said, ‘Oh I think she just relaxed,’” Stubbs said, referring to Williams’ older sister.

In an interview with The Associated Press on Saturday, Stubbs also described how the comeback preparations were already underway. She said she first started coaching Williams again in March and that she immediately noticed the 23-time Grand Slam champion could still play.

The loss, however, didn’t land the way it might have in a vacuum. Stubbs said the mood in the locker room from other players and coaches was resoundingly different—because everyone around Williams understood what it meant to step onto Centre Court after such a long absence.

“They know what it would be like to be in that position of not playing a match for close to four years. going on Centre Court at Wimbledon. knowing there’s how many millions of people around the world watching this match. ” Stubbs said. “There’s 15,000 people in Centre Court. They expect good tennis. They expect you to not embarrass yourself. So all the players know, to a small degree, what it must be like.”.

While the match itself set ratings records on ESPN, Williams’ performance also drew public praise from players including Coco Gauff, Naomi Osaka and Novak Djokovic.

Before the next day’s withdrawals, the comeback was shaped by what Williams did on the court—and what her knee demanded off it. She injured her right knee toward the end of the first set against Joint and withdrew from her doubles match with Venus on Saturday.

On Instagram. Williams posted images that she said “shows the fluid they drained from my knee after my singles match.” In the accompanying video. she showed herself walking with strapping up and down her right leg. and what appeared to be one of her daughters holding a cane for her. “The good news is my knee shouldn’t swell or collect that much fluid again,” Serena said. “The bad news is that. as hard as I tried. I just wasn’t able to get it ready for doubles.”.

Still, with the U.S. Open approaching, Williams signaled she could play again somewhere else soon. “All I can say,” Serena said, “is stay tuned to a city near you.”

Stubbs said she had been worried about a different aspect of Williams’ return—her past emotional outbursts and run-ins with chair umpires and linesjudges toward the end of her career. But Stubbs said Williams maintained her composure from start to finish.

“That was sort of like the one sort of thing that I asked. is that she try and — as hard as it was going to be — to control her emotions and her nerves and all that sort of stuff. ” Stubbs said. “I don’t think people even remotely can quantify the amount of pressure that was on her to walk out there and do what she did.”.

There was pressure off the court too. Stubbs said she was disappointed to see negative reactions to Williams’ return on social media. She said Williams was criticized for skipping her post-match duties because the injury was not announced until a day later.

Stubbs herself drew criticism online as well, and she pushed back in direct terms.

“I just don’t understand why people feel the need to tear somebody down,” Stubbs said. “What she’s doing out there is trying to play a sport she loves. That’s what it’s about. Show the kids, be out there, enjoy it and give the people another look at playing. … What is wrong on with a seven-time Wimbledon champion — a 23-time Grand Slam champion — wanting to play another time at Wimbledon?. God let her.”.

The conditions around that singles match also mattered. Because the match started late in the day and there were concerns about darkness, the roof over Centre Court was closed.

“Her was hitting the ball so well in practice and moving really well and the conditions were very different indoors,” Stubbs said. “They were heavy. Her ball wasn’t shooting through the court like it was outside.”

Even with the indoor ceiling and heavier conditions, Stubbs said Williams still showed signs of the game that has defined her career. She said Williams served beyond 120 mph and displayed heavy groundstrokes that landed within inches of the baseline. The real concern, Stubbs said, was movement.

“When you’re great, you’re great,” Stubbs said. “When you have great timing, you always have great timing. I saw that from the moment I stepped back on court with her. I was like, ‘Well, you never lost that.’”

Stubbs said rebuilding movement and workload would be the next challenge, especially at an older stage of a career that has already included far bigger comebacks than this one.

“And then it’s just getting the movement going and getting the body going and all that sort of stuff again and at a certain age you also have to monitor the workload. ” she said. “So what I saw out there didn’t surprise me at all. because I had been seeing it for months: The capacity to hit the ball as well as she’s always hit the ball.”.

Stubbs, an Australian who won six Grand Slam titles in women’s doubles and mixed doubles, said she had also coached Williams at the previous farewell at the 2022 U.S. Open. Now based in New York, Stubbs said she went down to Florida to begin coaching again in March.

“She was already hitting before that, but that’s when she was like, ‘OK, I need the eyeballs I trust on me,’” Stubbs said.

Serena also brought back her longtime hitting partner, Jarmere Jenkins, who co-coaches her with Stubbs. Stubbs said she has known Serena “since she was a kid,” and that Jenkins understands her closely. She also said Derick (Pierson), her fitness guy, is “one of her best friends.”

As for what comes next, Williams said in her injury post that she would play again, but Stubbs said the details are still being figured out.

“She’s not just going to do a one-off,” Stubbs said. “I think she would like to play more but that is 100% her decision. … I’m sure she’ll re-evaluate and reassess how she wants go forward and then we’ll be there for her either way.”

Stubbs said Williams had played two doubles matches before Wimbledon. even though she hadn’t played singles since the 2022 U.S. Open. Stubbs said ideal warm-up matches didn’t happen because Williams wanted to get the feeling of being back on the court first in two doubles tournaments. She said Williams and partner Victoria Mboko won in the first round at Queen’s Club. but the pair withdrew when Mboko was injured playing singles.

Williams and partner Karolina Muchova then lost in the first round at the Berlin Open.

“I would venture to say that if she’d had four or five more doubles matches, she would have even been better because she would’ve had that experience of feeling the big points and hitting the big returns on break point and hitting the serves big,” Stubbs said.

For all the praise and the attention, the core of Stubbs’ account was straightforward: Williams was returning with nerves, learning again in real time, and navigating a match staged under a closed roof—while her right knee dictated what the weekend could hold.

Serena Williams Wimbledon Rennae Stubbs Maya Joint Centre Court roof right knee injury doubles withdrawal U.S. Open