She’s the best tennis player of her generation.

And I’m not just talking about the women’s game. It’s not just Sharapova or Clijsters or Henin or her sister Venus she has trumped. Serena Williams has made the men’s champs Federer, Nadal and Djokovic look like also-rans.

She’s better than the lot. And it’s time she got some love.

Serena now stands on the verge of being the greatest player of all time as she attempts to win a calendar grand slam at the US Open in eight weeks’ time, which will equal the record of Steffi Graf and put her two away from reeling in Margaret Court.

Few doubt she will do it.

Despite this, the women’s world number one has rarely been a favourite with the crowd or the media.

She’s familiar with the fact the fans are more often on her opponent’s side — the underdog. She has taken the jibes about her muscularity, knowing that many tennis fans seem to think she has an almost unfair physical advantage.

And through all that, though it must have rankled, she has remained gracious and good-natured.

When the Williams sisters burst on the scene, they were given plenty of stick. As the two softly-spoken girls from Florida cut a swathe through the mostly white ranks of the professional women’s circuit there was an edge of panic in the media and the establishment.

It was rarely verbalised but the underlying issue was race. Was this the point where the prowess of black athletes transformed the sanctity of a comfortably closed shop for white people? Like the 100m sprint at the Olympics, like the ranks of the heavyweight boxing champions once dominated by preternaturally large Italians, Jews and Irish. The same went for Tiger Woods and golf.

It was given voice at the 2001 Indian Wells Masters when the crowd turned on Serena and her family in the gallery. After Venus withdrew from her match with an injury, father Richard was accused of pulling her out so Serena could win. The sour grapes that bubbled beneath the surface vented spitefully and unfairly. The mask dropped. The sisters boycotted Indian Wells.

In the media, Richard was portrayed as a stage parent, living out his dreams through his children, driving them obsessively. Even his presence with wife Oracene at their matches was questioned, with the implication he had too much control over his prodigious daughters.

Though it seemed from the outside to be a close, stable, loving family, efforts were made to destabilise that and to bring the Williams sisters down a notch.

The dynamic of their relationship was also brought into question. ‘They were rivals who hated to lose to one another’. Venus, who initially was the dominant player of the two, was said to be ‘hurt’ by her little sister’s success.

And all of this bedded in over time.

Venus ultimately became more accepted the more she lost. Her tally of seven grand slams, while incredible, would never threaten the established hegemony in tennis.

But Serena didn’t stop, she went on winning.

Unlike the other top tennis players, she picked and chose her events with an eye more on the quality of her own life. She avoided much of the WTP tour to pop up at a grand slam and take it home with her. In the past 15 grand slams she has won eight. Only Federer’s run of 11 in 16 between 2004 and 2007 is better in the modern era.

With her Wimbledon win she became the oldest woman to hold all grand slam titles simultaneously.

And yet it is not even the records, but her manner of winning that has set her apart — speed on the court, agility, strength and more than anything, grit.

(Originally published in RendezView)