THE SCOOP, JUNE 27

Roddick and Serena fight the sibling rivalry

By Matthew Cronin
tennisreporters.net

Susan Mullane Camerawork USA, Inc.

Taken at face value, Andy Roddick and Serena Williams are about as dissimilar as two people could be – one is a white 18-year-old who grew up with a bit of money in his pocket in the tony setting of Boca Raton and the other an African-American 18-year-old who grew up with only a little pocket change on a street of hard knocks in Compton.

Serena loves shopping and her dogs, while A-Rod is a college football junkie. By virtue of winning the '99 U.S. Open and a host of other titles, Serena has already established herself as an elite player. Playing only his first year on tour, Roddick has yet to establish himslef as a truly elite player, but has already posted significant enough results to have "top-10 potential" stamped all over his forehead.

But they do share a few things in common – a strong willed, charismatic brash older sibling, huge first serves, lethal forehands and a chance to win the Wimbledon Championships.

While making such a claim about '00 Wimby semifinalist Serena isn't exactly going out on a limb, saying this about the moss green Roddick is somewhat outrageous, considering that he has almost no Grand Slam history to base this claim on and his only significant win at a major came today against the perennially underachieving No. 11 seed, Thomas Johansson. But as Pat Cash said, there hasn't been this much buzz over a young player at the AELTC since Andre Agassi showed up in neon hair in '87. Roddick is probably still to inexperienced to win a series of big matches here, but he certainly has the weapons to mow down anyone in an individual match. Remember when Boric Becker won his first title in '85.

What did he have other than a big serve and willingness to do belly flops on the turf to retrieve volleys? The German had guts, spirit and a win at all costs attitude. That's what A-Rod has, plus he can murder the ball from the back court. He doesn't volley as well as Boric, but he is willing to come in as a threatening measure and can certainly close out points when given a makeable volley.

Despite her successes, Serena has mostly lived in the shadow of Venus' bright beam, playing the happy-go-lucky, giggling little sis to Venus's more serious and opinionated figure. Serena's time in the sun lasted exactly nine months, when she held the gold mantle of being the defending U.S. Open champ and Venus hadn't won a Slam yet. But in last year's in the Wimby semis, Venus tore off Serena's cloak and then won the title. The gangly antelope then went on a tear, winning the U.S. Open and the Olympic gold medal. Consequently, she was named the WTA's Player of the year.

For her part, Serena took most of the fall off and except for her exceptional title run at Indian Wells, has been a rather pedestrian player this year. So this week, while Venus struts around with the nearly impenetrable aura of a defending champ, Serena gets to answer questions about the status of her dogs and what she likes most about England. Of course, she also gets peppered with queries about what was like to be Venus' younger sibling growing up. She said she loved it.

"For me, it served as a great inspiration because we both grew up practicing on the same court, he same day, working really hard," Serena said. "Obviously when she was doing very well, I wanted to be there, up at the top. I wanted to be a player, a Grand Slam champion. I wanted to be the best. That's' what I'm still trying to work for."

When asked more serious questions, Serena showed that she is still chaffing from her 2000 loss to Venus here. "Maybe I had too many easy matches last year, and I got a tough match and went ballistic," Serena said. "It's over said and done. I missed a great opportunity then because I didn't get to play singles in the Olympics because I lost and I was really disapointed. But this year there is nothing to worry about. I'm taking it one match at time and taking every opponent seriously. [I'll] fight, just go for the plate."

More importantly, Serena said that if she happens to face Venus again, she won't curl up in ball and shake. "For sure, because I was in that situation before," she said. "You learn from everything."

A-ROD HAS A BIG BROTHER, TOO

Susan Mullane Camerawork USA, Inc.

Roddick's older brother John was never a Grand Slam champ, but he was a big-time junior player and fiery college legend at the University of Georgia. Andy used to tag along as "John's kid brother" and wasn't accepted as his own player until he went on a run in the juniors as a 16-year-old.

"All the people that played with him still look at me as 'Little Roddick," no matter what I do," Roddick said. "He had a lot of influence on me. He did the whole junior thing before I did. Anytime I had a question, I had someone in the family with experience. I used to travel with him to junior tournaments. I have a lot of cool memories from that."

Andy can beat John now, who's an assistant coach at Georgia, but he didn't score his first win over him to until last year. While that won't go down as the most important victory of his career, it was certainly a landmark win in the psyche of a baby brother. Now all Andy has to do is take down the Earl of Croatia, Goran Ivanisevic, who all but owns the fans here and is likely playing his last Wimbledon. Little Roddick is more than capable of goring Goran, but he will have to bring John's never-say-die attitude on court.

"It's great. I got to play Michael Chang at Roland Garros and now I get to play Goran at Wimbledon. I'm looking forward to it.," Roddick said.