Australian Open - Serena Williams advanced to second round at Melbourne

The American tennis player of 27 years old, Serena Williams, was very successful in her first game of the Australian Open by beating the Chinese Yuan Meng 6-3, 6-2 this Tuesday at the Rod Laver Arena. Her game performance was slower than usual due to the heated weather conditions of the early afternoon, but she did really well even with the high temperatures of this summer at Melbourne. The American played conservatively and took her time to control the tempo of the game, even though she made 31 unforced errors in attempts to shorten the points.

It took Serena 75 minutes to defeat the Chinese, since she took her time between points to grasp her breath and focus on the win. Yuan Meng was restricted to only five winners; even when she was trying to play back to Serena, Williams was too much for Meng.

With this win the American Serena Williams will be playing the second round of the Australian Open against the winner between Anastasiya Yakimova and Gisela Dulko. On the other hand, her sister Venus Williams also got her victory in the first round by defeating Angelique Kerber with an score of 6-3,6-3. So, if the Williams keep their pace as it is, it's possible that they face each other in the quarterfinals of the tournament. However, there still a long way to go before that can happen.

It has to be mentioned that this could be Serena's fourth title at the Australian Open and maybe the 10th Grand Slam title of her career. Serena Williams won the Aussie Open in 2003, 2005 and 2007. Now after a year it is expected for some people that she wins the Melbourne title in another odd year.

When asked about this, she said that she will try to give her best this year and focus on the title. "I am superstitious but is there anything to the odd theory? No. One year I wasn't able to come back and defend my title. One year I went crazy. A couple years I went completely crazy. So hopefully I'll be able to stay focused this year," stated the American tennis player.

Serena also said about her first game of the tournament that it was a really hot day (reaching 104 degrees), but that she was able to control her emotions and aggressiveness to try to conserve some of her energy for the next matches coming up.

On the other hand, some media that has noticed that she is now more slender than she used to, have made some questions about if it is easier for her to handle hot days like this now, but as a professional tennis player, Serena Williams expressed smiling that it didn't bother her and she is just focusing on playing at her best at the tournament.

We hope the best for this great female player, who has gain reputation over the years and has become one of the best tennis players in the WTA history. We also hope that she can keep winning and to obtain with her efforts the Australian Open title for a fourth time.