‘She’ could have been the ‘BEST Player of All Time’ NOT Serena: Rick Macci

‘She’ could have been the ‘BEST Player of All Time’ NOT Serena: Rick Macci

Serena and Venus Williams

The Williams sisters have been on the list of best tennis players for a long time. While Venus Williams has won 7 Grand Slam Titles, sister Serena has won a whopping 23!

Venus is regarded as one of the all-time greats of tennis. She was ranked World No.1 in both doubles and singles. Their coach, Rick Macci is extremely proud of them and in a recent interview with Essentially Sports, he talked about the early days of the Williams sisters.

As the interview proceeded, on being asked more about the sisters he claimed that, Venus Williams could have been the greatest player ever and won more Major titles than anyone, including sister Serena Williams.

Currently, Venus ranks 316th in the WTA ranking while Serena ranks 41 in the world ranking. American feels the physical gifts Venus Williams had were not fully utilised, despite her amazing career.

In another interview Rick recalled incidents from Venus’ early days of learning tennis, “As a youngster growing up, Venus was obviously bigger, stronger,” Macci said. “But more importantly, she was more ‘stick to it’, she was more mature. Serena when she was little, she was like a little prankster. She was a happy-go-lucky kid, she wasn’t like locked in at that age yet. So it’s not where you start, it’s where you finish.”

He also added, “So yeah, Venus was much, much better you know [at] 11, 12, 13,” Macci continued.” When Serena started maturing, that’s when Richard [Williams] would say even more – ‘I think Serena is gonna be better’. Now, I always thought Venus could have been the best player of all time.”

Rick thought Venus Williams was going to Play in her own Different Style

Venus Williams
Venus Williams

Later in the interview, the esteemed coach explained why he think Venus was going to be the best.

“I always thought Venus was going to serve and come in more, a little bit,” Rick said.

“Take your second serve, smack it in the corner, get in your face. Her vertical jump, she can jump higher than anybody on the tour, you cannot lob this girl. And she has a great wingspan. But the problem is you never saw her at the net that much. I thought she was going to play different.”

According to him, Venus’ physical attributes played a major role in her astounding performance. She could jump higher than other players and had a great wingspan, all these capabilities Serena did not have.

“With those gifts from above that Serena didn’t have, that amazing jumping ability and wingspan, I thought Venus would be up at the net, in your face,” Macci added. “Even if you don’t volley, especially in women’s tennis you can just scare people. So I thought she was going to play a different style. So I really believe that Venus could have won more Grand Slams than anybody. Her gifts from above, I don’t think were taken advantage of,” he further said.

Rick thinks that the qualities of Venus were not fully utilised, if they did she would have ended up being the greatest player of all times.

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