By Mike Dickson for the Daily Mail
Published: 22:29 GMT, 24 March 2019 | Updated: 22:29 GMT, 24 March 2019
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This summer’s singles at Wimbledon is starting to look like the best hope left for Serena Williams when it comes to winning a Grand Slam in this final act of her career.
On a mission to claim a major as a working mother, the 37-year-old American may be running out of road after she failed to complete another tournament when pulling out of the Miami Open on Saturday.
Just like her exit here a year ago — when she stormed out of the stadium immediately having lost to Naomi Osaka — there was no explanatory media appearance, merely a bald statement saying she had a knee injury.
This summer’s singles at Wimbledon is looking like the best hope left for Serena Williams
This comes after retiring mid-match at Indian Wells earlier this month with a viral illness. That followed the spectacular collapse in the Australian Open quarter-finals, when she lost to Karolina Pliskova after leading 5-1 in a deciding set, having tweaked her ankle.
It is natural enough that, in her late thirties, her body is becoming less co-operative as the search goes on longer than expected for Grand Slam title No 24.
Given that Roland Garros poses more challenges to her increasingly cumbersome movement, and that so many rival players enjoy the US Open’s hard courts, the grass at SW19 that she loves surely represents the best chance of success.
After every setback the question arises where she will turn up next.
She is theoretically obliged to play the Madrid Open in early May, a significant lead-in event to the French Open but she appears so sparingly on the WTA Tour that it is far from guaranteed.
