Article by Gerhard Grundhammer

Venus Ebone Starr Williams was born on  17 June 1980. Only 4 years later she started to train her right forehand and her two-handed backhand shots.

As Venus had grown to 6`1", which was about 5 years ago, she started her career as a professional tennis-player, and she won already a couple of unimportant tournaments as Oklahoma City and Munich, and a few not so unimportant ones, like the US-Open and the Australian-Open (both in 2000 and 2001). All together she has 26 WTA-singles-titles!

In 2000 Venus had a winning streak of 35 matches in a row, but the year 2000 was also the year, when Venus and Jelena first played..... and Jelena won!!! Actually Jelena did not only win vs. the Californian Girl, she more gave her a tennis-lesson as she knocked Venus out of the Italian Open, by winning 6-1 and 6-2.

In 2001 Jelena and Venus met twice, and Venus won both occasions in straight sets.

Not only because mr. williams holds the world record for the fastest service speed she prefers fast surfaces as grass and hard-court. In 2002 she won 31 out of her 34 games on hard-court, which means she wins 11 matches before she is going to loose 1! And guess what match the one vs. Jelena is. It`s the 12th, after eleven straight wins!!!!!!

Their last meeting should have happend at the final of Paris on 4th of February 2002, but Jelena could not play there because of an injury. Now they meet eachother again, both power-hitters are fit, and both girls are ready to win that title.

To proceed to the final top-seeded Venus beat J. Husarova at round two 6-4 and 6-1 after a first round bye. Next on the line were Anne Kremer (6-3 and 6-2), Kim Clijsters (6-3, 5-7 and 6-4) and yesterday Lindsay Davenport (6-2 and 6-1).

"I am not best friend with the williams sisters, but I talk with them more than anyone else on the tour! A lot of poeple think they are arrogant and not good for the game, but I totally disagree. Both have good personalities" JELENA DOKIC