The 23-time Grand Slam singles and 14-time doubles champion will play Australia’s Ajla Tomljanovic in the third round of singles on Friday. Venus Williams lost in the first round on Tuesday.
Thursday night could have been Serena and Venus’ last match as a doubles team. Czech Republic’s 17-year-old Noskova and 37-year-old Hrateka advanced to the second round with a 7-6(5), 6-4 win.
“I think we did a good job and I’m very sorry we beat them, but we’re very happy we did,” Hradecka told the 23,000-plus fans. match
This will be the first time she will team up with Noskova in doubles.
The Williams pair started well and took two set points at 5-4 in the first, but the Czechs fought back. Hradecka and Noskova trailed in the tiebreaker but won the last four points.
They led 4-1 in the second set, but Venus and Serena won three straight games to tie it. But the Czech broke Serena to go ahead 5-4, then in the final game Hrateka hit a backhand at the net between the sisters for the match winner.
The Williams sisters entered the US Open as doubles wild cards. They last played at the 2018 French Open when they reached the round of 16 in doubles.
Serena defeated Annette Kontavit 7-6(4), 2-6, 6-2 in the singles match on Wednesday. It was Williams’ fourth tournament since announcing in Vogue magazine that she would “retire from tennis” after the US Open.
“I don’t like the word retirement. It doesn’t seem like a modern word to me. I was thinking of it as a change, but I want to be careful how I use that word, something that’s very specific. And important to the community,” Williams, 40, said this month. said in a Vogue article published earlier.
“Evolution is probably the best word to describe what I’m doing. I’m here to tell you that I’m evolving away from tennis and into other things that are important to me,” he said.
Venus Williams, 42, has not announced her future tennis plans.
If they both retire from the game this year, they will have amassed 48 Grand Slam titles (singles, doubles and mixed doubles) as a family and the best mark in doubles finals (14-0). They won three Olympic gold medals in doubles and a gold in singles each.
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