ESPN sports analyst Chris “Mad Dog” Russo said Serena Williams was “awful” versus Emma Raducanu and he doubts the American can make a deep US Open. Williams, 40, suffered a 6-4 6-0 loss to Emma Raducanu in the Cincinnati first round.
Williams is now coming off back-to-back losses versus Belinda Bencic and Raducanu, in which she didn’t win a single set. Next up for Williams is the US Open, where she is set to end her professional career. “First off, by this performance last night she is not going to make a run at the US Open.
She has been awful. She has played three matches in a year and she is 41 years old in September. What do you expect. It’s unfortunate but she hasn’t played well,” Russo said on ESPN’s First Take.
Russo picked Martina Navratilova ahead of Williams in the GOAT debate
“Based on the fact that in Martina’s era, she had to deal with Graf, Seles, (Hana) Mandlikova, Austin, and Chrissy (Evert),” Russo said last week when asked whether Williams deserved the GOAT honor.
“Chrissy, Seles, and Graf are three of the top five or six players in the history of women’s tennis.” Serena, in this period of her dominance which has been remarkable, there has never been a top 10 player in historical purposes who she has gone up against.
Venus is not a top-10 all-time player. Remember, Martina lost eight Grand Slam finals to all-time great players, she lost two to Graf, one to (Monica) Seles, she lost four to Chris Evert, and one to Tracy Austin. Her period of tennis in the 80s, in my opinion, from a women’s tennis standpoint, was much deeper and much better than who Serena’s been able to beat in the last 20 years.
Serena is great and it’s debatable. You want to put her number 1? You can debate it and no problem.” This Wednesday, Russo was asked about his take that wasn’t welcomed by some. Russo explained that he is not saying Williams does not deserve to be mentioned or considered as the greatest player of all time, but that he just feels it’s Navratilova who has done more to be considered as the greatest player of all-time.
