The Debate: Is Serena disrespecting the WTA?

Serena Williams has pulled out of the WTA Finals for the second year in a row because of injury. After playing only three WTA events this year, is she showing enough respect to the Tour?

The argument that Serena is doing the right thing:

By Matt Trollope
Serena Williams’ decision to pull out of the WTA Finals and shut down her 2016 season was met with mixed responses.

Some believed it was a sensible decision to ensure career longevity. Others felt it was a snubbing of the WTA tour’s flagship event.

A few years ago, I would have agreed with the latter. Serena Williams, c.2007-2010, was a part-time player who dipped in and out of the tour when she felt like it, bobbed up to win major titles, and bemoaned the fact that she was ranked No.2 when she held many of those major titles, conveniently ignoring the fact she was averaging only about 12 tournaments a year.

But since returning from her life-threatening injuries and illness of 2011 and linking up with Patrick Mouratoglou in 2012, Serena showed a renewed dedication to the sport. That peaked in 2013 when she played over 80 matches across 16 tournaments and won 11 titles.

Now, Serena has reverted somewhat to her previous form. She played just eight events in 2016, and for a second year in a row, no tournaments after the US Open.

Yet this time it’s different. Serena is genuinely suffering from physical wear and tear, having battled knee, adductor and shoulder problems throughout the season. She’s now 35 years old, an unprecedented age to still be contending for majors – and winning them – and remaining at the top of the game.

Serena’s priorities are different from the rest of the playing group, and because of her age and circumstances, so they should be. Who else will ever find themselves in a position to pass Steffi Graf as the Open Era leader in major singles titles? This is history far more important than events in the Asian swing, and should be prioritised as such.

Williams will probably continue to peak for the majors and drop any other events that may jeopardise her chances at them. If that meant skipping the WTA Finals to ensure she’s healthy for 2017, so be it.

Plus, almost anything Serena Williams does while on hiatus is a positive thing for the women’s game anyway.

When she appears at glamorous international fashion festivals in New York and Milan, or joins Beyonce on stage at the pop star’s Formation World Tour, she’s doing so as the world’s most recognisable female tennis player. This only serves to benefit the WTA by cementing the profile of the women’s game as the world’s most marketable female sport.

Why else would the WTA be so quick as to promote these happenings on their website and social media channels?

Williams should not be criticised for this latest scheduling decision. If it serves to extend her remarkable career that little bit longer, that can only be of benefit to the women’s game.

The argument that Serena should do more:

By Paul Moore
Is Serena showing enough respect to the WTA? No.

For the second year in a row Serena has prematurely called time on her season after a semifinal exit from the US Open. This year her excuse for missing the Asian swing and the WTA Finals was a recurring shoulder injury. In 2015, she simply suggested that she was struggling with a general life malaise.

At the tail end of a season, almost every player struggles with fatigue and injuries. Some choose to honour their commitments to their respective sports, others prefer to step away from the spotlight and invest time in healing.

Serena has once again chosen to do the latter.

But there is something different about this year. Because while she once again called time on her season early, the simple fact is that her WTA commitments barely got started. In 2015 she played in seven WTA events and won two. In 2016 she has played in just three WTA events, winning one. In fact, this year she has played more ITF events (five – four Grand Slams and the Olympics) than she has WTA.

You could argue that at this stage in her career – and with the loss of the cumulative No.1 ranking – the WTA has little to offer Serena. If she wins another Miami or Rome title, does it really matter? What matters now for someone who has won almost everything the game has to offer is Slams. She needs one more to move clear of Steffi Graf and three more to be the outright leader in Slam titles.

But that goal – Serena’s goal, if you will – only really benefits Serena. Tennis, while it will undoubtedly celebrate her achievements, will not be any better off should she realise that goal (or worse should she not).

Yet in that single minded pursuit of her goals, Serena is shining a spotlight on the value, or lack thereof, that she places in WTA events – including the showpiece WTA Finals.

That is bad for the development of the sport.

Let’s be very clear: over the course of her career the WTA has given more to Serena than she has to it. It has given her the platform on which she could make history; it has enabled her to become one of the most celebrated athletes on the planet; and it has helped her to make an eye-watering amount of money.

Does she not have a duty to pay some of that back? And by paying back, I mean giving legitimacy to the WTA’s premiere events by continuing to be committed to them? To support their growth and development at a time when selling tickets and getting airtime is increasingly competitive? And to demonstrate to other players, as a figurehead in the sport, that these events matter?

Of course she does. And in 2016, with the loss of their other marquee star Maria Sharapova, the WTA needed her more than ever.

Serena failed to deliver.

The goal of any successful athlete, their legacy if you will, should be to leave their sport in a better state than when they found it. If Serena continues to cut back on her WTA commitments and further undermine the credibility of the events on which she has built her career, she runs the risk of leaving the WTA worse for wear.