Angelique Kerber was born in January 1988, seven months after Steffi Graf won the first of her open era record 22 Grand Slam titles.
Graf’s dominance of women’s tennis was consequently a permanent feature in her life as she made her way through junior school, a source of enormous national pride in Germany as she built upon her unique ‘Golden Slam’ of all four major titles plus an Olympic medal in that 1988 season.
How much of inspiration she drew, then, from the text message received from Graf on reaching this year’s Australian Open final only she can know, but she has made no secret of her adoration of her compatriot.
“She was always an idol for me,” said Kerber.
“I was always watching a lot of matches, also on YouTube sometimes. I mean, she was one of the best players in the world, she won so many Grand Slams.
“I met her few times. She's a great person. When you hit with her, she's still playing really well. Of course, when you talk with her, it's always a great honour to speak with her.
“She just told me the last time that I'm on a good way, ‘just believe in yourself, practice hard. One day the time will be there when you practice really well,’ because she was believing in me.”
It is not, then, overly fanciful to hypothesise that in going on to win her first Grand Slam title in Melbourne and now reaching a first Wimbledon final Kerber has found something extra from the stimulus of battling to protect her great compatriot’s legacy which Serena Williams has been poised to match since winning here a year ago.
If that feels like an exercise in seeking to prevent the inevitable, in taking it on she is building a formidable legacy of her own that seemed unlikely through a dozen years as a journeyman professional and if her semi-final meeting with Serena’s older sister Venus, herself a five time Wimbledon champion, was not always of the highest quality, pock-marked with errors on both sides of the net in the first set in particular, she always seemed much the more likely to prevail.
The way she completed the match too was telling, as Venus applied maximum pressure during what was probably the best point of the match, before the left-hander came up with an exquisitely angled cross-court winner.
On the 20th anniversary of the last of Graf’s seven Wimbledon wins it will surely be a different matter against Serena, who can match that mark as well as the German’s overall Grand Slam haul with victory this weekend.
Her demolition of Elena Vesnina was a cruel demonstration of the gulf between the world’s best player and an opponent who came into this tournament unseeded and has done well, but was wholly out of her depth in this environment against this opponent.
The first set was brief, the second briefer, sending the historians out checking to see whether the 48 minutes it took was an all-time record for a Wimbledon semi-final. A couple, before official timings began, are reckoned to have been marginally quicker, but that will be little consolation to Vesnina.
On this form it is hard to see even as motivated an opponent as Kerber appears to be, denying her, even if she continues to protest that matching Graf is not among her priorities.
If that was in danger of coming across slightly disrespectfully, there was, too, a lack of magnanimity when she was asked to assess her year, albeit there could be no argument with the younger Williams’ analysis of the facts.
“I think it's great,” she said of having reached her third Grand Slam final of the year, having lost to Kerber in Australia and then to Spain’s Garbine Muguroza at last month’s French Open.
“I mean, I think for anyone else in this whole planet, it would be a wonderful accomplishment. For me, it's about obviously holding the trophy and winning, which would make it a better accomplishment for me. For me, it's not enough. But I think that's what makes me different. That's what makes me Serena.”
She was rather more generous when asked about the ease of her victory over Vesnina, attributing it to having brought the right attitude into the match.
“It wasn't anything that was super easy. I was very intense the whole time. I ran and I worked hard. I served well, I moved well,” said the defending champion.
“The scoreline just reflected me doing what I know I can do.”
Kerber can, too, take satisfaction from having earned her opponent’s full attention.
“Obviously it's significant that she beat me in Australia because that's the last time we did play and also just as an opponent, she's great,” said Williams.
“She does things well. She moves excellent. She's fun to play.”
That last phrase may yet be the most telling one, however, particularly now that Serena has big sister to avenge.
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