{"id":91565,"date":"2025-07-25T14:14:17","date_gmt":"2025-07-25T14:14:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/91565\/"},"modified":"2025-07-25T14:14:17","modified_gmt":"2025-07-25T14:14:17","slug":"like-a-god-venus-williams-no-match-for-world-no-24-but-opponent-pays-ultimate-tribute-after-halting-fairytale-return","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/91565\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Like a god’ – Venus Williams no match for world No.24 but opponent pays ultimate tribute after halting fairytale return"},"content":{"rendered":"

Magdalena Frech was the villain of the piece in Washington, but made sure she won the crowd over after knocking Venus Williams out of the Citi Open.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Williams<\/a>, a tennis icon who has won seven Grand Slam titles, made headlines this week as she returned to the court after a 16-month hiatus<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Frech<\/a><\/p>\n

6<\/p>\n

Frech paid a heartwarming tribute to Williams after knocking her out of the Citi OpenCredit: Getty<\/p>\n

Aged 45, she became the oldest woman to win a tour-level singles match<\/a> since Martina Navratilova in 2004 with an opening-round victory over Peyton Stearns on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

But the American’s run was ended by No. 5 seed Frech in Washington DC, who became emotional after her 6-2, 6-2 second round victory.<\/p>\n

“She’s a super star, she’s like a god here, so it was very emotional for me to handle this match,” Frech said of Williams.<\/p>\n

“I can’t even imagine myself in 17 years to still on the court — no chance!<\/p>\n

“It was really a great match and a great honor to play her.”<\/p>\n

Williams, who played four matches — two singles and two doubles — over the course of four days, admitted she ‘ran out of gas’ before being knocked out of singles competition.<\/p>\n

“Oh, I had so much fun,” she said.<\/p>\n

“Definitely not the result I wanted, but still a learning experience. The part about sport (and) life is that you never stop learning.<\/p>\n

“I got to play a lot of matches here and that definitely was a plus. The fans in DC are just epic. I couldn’t have been happier with my first week back.<\/p>\n

“I feel like I ran out of gas today, unfortunately.<\/p>\n

\"Williams<\/a><\/p>\n

6<\/p>\n

Williams admitted she ran out of energy in her second-round defeatCredit: Getty\"She<\/a><\/p>\n

6<\/p>\n

She is expected to return to the court at the Cincinnati Open next monthCredit: Getty\"Frech<\/a><\/p>\n

6<\/p>\n

Frech described Williams as a ‘god’ after sending her packingCredit: Getty\/WTA<\/p>\n

“I tried to find the energy, and I didn’t find it.”<\/p>\n

While Williams took an early 2-1 lead against Frech, the 27-year-old hit back with a dominant run of seven straight games en-route to a comfortable win.<\/p>\n

The world No. 24 moves on to face Elena Rybakina in her quarterfinal match on Friday.<\/p>\n

Williams, meanwhile, is expected to be back on the court again soon, and has accepted a wildcard to play in the Cincinnati Open next month.<\/p>\n

The American also shared a significant personal update with fans earlier this week.<\/p>\n

Is Venus Williams in a relationship?<\/p>\n

During an interview after her first-round win in Washington, the five-time Wimbledon<\/a> champion confirmed her engagement to actor Andrea Preti.<\/p>\n

\"Williams<\/a><\/p>\n

6<\/p>\n

Williams confirmed her engagement to Preti this weekCredit: Getty\"He<\/a><\/p>\n

6<\/p>\n

He had the opportunity to watch her play for the first time in DCCredit: Getty<\/p>\n

As they were speaking post-game, interviewer Rennae Stubbs called Williams a ‘newly engaged woman’ and the tennis star smiled in response.<\/p>\n

“Yes, my fianc\u00e9 is here,\u201d she said, sparking applause from the crowd.<\/p>\n

“And he really encouraged me to keep playing.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were so many times where I just wanted to coast and kind of chill.\u201d<\/p>\n

“You guys don\u2019t know how much work goes into this, like it\u2019s a nine to five except you\u2019re running the whole time. Lifting weights and just like dying, and then you repeat it the next time.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo he encouraged me to get through this, and it\u2019s wonderful to be here. He\u2019s never seen me play.\u201d<\/p>\n

As well as losing to Frech in singles competition, Williams and her partner Hailey Baptiste have also been knocked out of the doubles.<\/p>\n

They were beaten 6-4, 3-6, 10-6 by Taylor Townsend and Zhang Shuai, who advanced to face Emma Raducanu<\/a> and Rybakina in the semis.<\/p>\n

After a 16-month gap between her matches, Williams will be back in action again in a couple of weeks after being handed a wild card into the Cincinnati Open.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Magdalena Frech was the villain of the piece in Washington, but made sure she won the crowd over…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":91566,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[58622,60770,8352,5224,62,1464,10119,67,132,68,10118,46604,60697,60773,60774,60776,60771,60772,60775,52250,2071],"class_list":{"0":"post-91565","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-citi-open","9":"tag-citi-open-schedule","10":"tag-magdalena-frech","11":"tag-serena-williams","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-tennis","14":"tag-tennis-news","15":"tag-united-states","16":"tag-unitedstates","17":"tag-us","18":"tag-us-open","19":"tag-venus-williams","20":"tag-venus-williams-comeback","21":"tag-venus-williams-engaged","22":"tag-venus-williams-grand-slams","23":"tag-venus-williams-hiatus","24":"tag-venus-williams-last-match","25":"tag-venus-williams-next-match","26":"tag-venus-williams-partner","27":"tag-washington-open","28":"tag-wimbledon"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114914293441277829","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91565","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=91565"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91565\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/91566"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=91565"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=91565"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=91565"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}