{"id":326310,"date":"2025-08-07T22:29:11","date_gmt":"2025-08-07T22:29:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/326310\/"},"modified":"2025-08-07T22:29:11","modified_gmt":"2025-08-07T22:29:11","slug":"venus-williams-says-how-she-thinks-the-cincinnati-open-compares-to-other-tournaments-after-receiving-a-wildcard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/326310\/","title":{"rendered":"Venus Williams says how she thinks the Cincinnati Open compares to other tournaments after receiving a wildcard"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Venus Williams is back at the Cincinnati Open, defying every expectation concerned with age in professional sport.<\/strong><\/p>\n

At 45 years old, Venus<\/a> made history at the Washington Open<\/a>, defeating Peyton Stearns to become the oldest winner of a WTA Tour match since Martina Navratilova, who won a match at 47 years old in 2004.<\/p>\n

Despite her health and injury struggles<\/a>, Venus flouted the laws of nature by also winning a doubles match at the Washington Open while paired with Hailey Baptiste.<\/p>\n

\"VenusPhoto by Scott Taetsch\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Venus has since travelled west to the state of Ohio to compete in the Cincinnati Open.<\/p>\n

The seven-time Grand Slam singles champion spoke to reporters before her first-round match, expressing her love for the Cincinnati Open<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Venus Williams says the Cincinnati Open is \u2018the pinnacle\u2019<\/p>\n

Speaking to reporters in Cincinnati, Venus said: \u201cThis event has always been so exciting. The fans travel\u00a0 from all over the US to come here. You can just see them coming, when you\u2019re in the airport you see them all coming, and that part has been very exciting.<\/p>\n

There are very few chances to play in the States now as an American, so I personally cherish any opportunity to play at home.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe crowd has been just insane and fantastic here, which is just\u2026 it\u2019s such a great feeling to have that support.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd obviously this is the pinnacle right? I don\u2019t want to compare any other tournaments to this because there\u2019s only positives to focus on but this is the level tournaments should aspire to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Venus also spoke about the Cincinnati Open\u2019s redevelopment. The tournament has undergone a $260 million renovation.<\/p>\n

Venus said: \u201cYeah I haven\u2019t been here in a while so it was an amazing surprise to see the site redeveloped, and also in such a short time, and I think this is a great representation of what tennis should be, that we should always be progressing forward and super happy to, you know, perform here. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s like tennis paradise\u00a0[smiling].\u201d<\/p>\n

Venus Williams\u2019 first-round opponent in Cincinnati<\/p>\n

Venus Williams\u2019 task was made no less easy after discovering her first-round opponent.<\/p>\n

The 45-year-old will face Spain\u2019s Jessica Bouzas Maneiro, who reached the quarter-final stage of the Canadian before losing to Canadian 18-year-old Victoria Mboko.<\/p>\n

\"JessicaPhoto by Robert Prange\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Venus will be hoping to replicate her form in Washington, while Bouzas Maneiro will look to go a few steps further in Cincinnati than she did in Montreal.<\/p>\n

The pair are due to face off in Cincinnati at 6:20 pm GMT on Thursday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Venus Williams is back at the Cincinnati Open, defying every expectation concerned with age in professional sport. At…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":326311,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4105],"tags":[107663,79,1068,16,15,14935,101908],"class_list":{"0":"post-326310","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-cincinnati-open","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-tennis","11":"tag-uk","12":"tag-united-kingdom","13":"tag-venus-williams","14":"tag-wta-tennis-players"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114989850836030559","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/326310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=326310"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/326310\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/326311"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=326310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=326310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=326310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}