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While Justine Henin and Amelie Mauresmo were battling it out by a breezy seaside in the Eastbourne final yesterday, the other two favourites for the Wimbledon women's title, Serena Williams and Maria Sharapova, were completing at leisure their preparations at the All England Club.
Whether it's better to be getting serious matches under your skirt at this stage or to be taking it comparatively easy practising before the Big W's curtain rises tonight is debatable, but Serena is in no doubt. Let them charge about in Eastbourne if they want to, was her take, but leave me out.
"I've never played a warm-up tournament before Wimbledon," said the woman who won there in 2002 and again the following year, lost to Sharapova in the 2004 final and did not play last summer because of injury. "This is, I think, the best route for me. Anyway, it rains a lot in Eastbourne, I'm glad they're duking it out over there."
These days Serena does not play a lot anywhere, but still seems to represent as big a threat as anyone when the majors come around. Playing only 16 matches in an injury-plagued 2006 season nearly cost her a place in the top 100.
Marching into January's Australian Open short of practice and bearing a ranking of 81, she claimed her eighth - and most surprising - Grand Slam by destroying Sharapova in the final.
After winning her "home" event in Miami in March, the younger Williams deemed two clay events, in Charleston and Rome, sufficient preparation for the French Open, only to exit in the quarter-finals to the eventual champion Henin.
She calls her display that day "horrendous, outrageously absurd" and promised: "That's not gonna happen again. I'm not gonna go out without a fight. If I do go out, it's going to be with a punch, with a bang."
The top-seeded Henin, once more her prospective quarter-final opponent, is hereby warned. Though seeded seventh, Serena is the bookies' choice for Wimbledon at 3-1, just ahead of Henin at 10-3. Quite right, she said yesterday: "I believe I'm definitely the best player in the world if I'm playing well, it's hard for anyone to beat me. It's not even a belief, it's more of a fact. I think a lot of people understand that. I don't think anyone that has to play me goes home and shouts with joy.
"The best Serena always shows up for any event whenever I'm healthy. For me, it's always been about being healthy. I'm feeling pretty healthy now." While sharing Serena's opinion about the wisdom of giving Eastbourne a miss, Sharapova is not able to talk so positively about health on Wimbledon's eve because of the shoulder injury which has hampered her all this year.
"It's still not exactly where I want it to be. Some days are better than others, but in the last few weeks I've been able to play good and steady," she said. If Sharapova is to win Wimbledon again the chances are that she must remove both Williamses from her path, though any Serena clash would not come before the final.
She has lost twice to Serena this year, both times badly, but insisted: "I'm looking forward to the challenge of changing that."
Perhaps that is because her triumph at the age of 17 in 2004 means that Wimbledon remains special.
"It's amazing," she said. "I get goosebumps every time I drive through the village, whenever I see my name on the board, by the trophies. It's an incredible feeling, a bit surreal because I feel like it happened so long ago.
"When I do see my name it's a bit of a reality check, like, yes, that really did happen. Every year I get my member's badge, it's really special because I don't think about those things on a daily basis - wow, I'm a Wimbledon champion.
To see her name up there again, Sharapova reckons Serena will prove the main obstacle - "she's physically one of the strongest" - but praises Henin as "probably the most consistent player this year, as well as last".
And a winner at Eastbourne yesterday, too.
- INDEPENDENT
