MELBOURNE, Australia – After taking a tumble on the next-to-last point of the match, Serena Williams got up and whipped a backhand winner down the line to finish off her second-round match at the Australian Open and her 500th career win.
With the 6-0, 6-4 victory over Barbora Zahlavova Strycova on Thursday, Williams extended her winning streak to 16 matches at Melbourne Park, where she won back-to-back titles in 2009 and ’10 but couldn’t play last year due to injury.
Her participation had been in doubt again after she badly sprained her ankle two weeks ago at a warmup tournament, which is why the Rod Laver Arena went silent when Williams fell onto the court in the penultimate rally and sat, watching, as Strycova’s shot floated out.
“It’s fine. I just have wobbly ankles,” she said in a TV interview after the match. “I wasn’t meant to be a ballerina or anything.”
It was the 500th win on tour, something she’d wanted to achieve since her older sister, Venus, passed the milestone.
“I knew I had to get there too, because I do everything she does,” she said. Venus Williams, a seven-time Grand Slam winner with career win-loss record of 598-147 as a pro, is
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