Serena Williams composed herself after a first-set loss and a burst of anger to vanquish tenacious fellow American Christina McHale 6-7(7), 6-2, 6-4 in a nail-biting second-round match at Wimbledon on Friday.
The defending champion finally ran out a winner against the world number 65, marching on in her quest to emulate Steffi Graf’s Open era record of 22 grand slam singles titles. Williams also notched a record 800 aces at Wimbledon during the match.
Williams thought she had won the first set and was walking back to her chair after a McHale forehand was called long with the world number one 5-4 and 40-30 up. To her chagrin, however, a hawkeye challenge showed the ball brushing the baseline.
McHale went on to win the game and force a tiebreak in which a rattled Williams made a string of errors, including two double faults, before burying a forehand into the net to lose the set.
Furious as she sat down, she hammered her racket into the ground in frustration before hurling it behind her.
But the 34-year-old put the disappointment behind her and showed the battling form that has won her six Wimbledon crowns to take the next two sets, closing out the two-and-a-half hour match with three aces.
(With inputs from Reuters)
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