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Serena Williams forehand at Australian Open

‘I feel like I can still improve’ – Serena Williams gives Australian Open warning after dominant performance


Serena Williams says there is a lot more to come from her after she powered into the Australian Open second round.

Williams needed just 58 minutes to dismantle beat Anastasia Potapova 6-0 6-3, and she barely looked like she was breaking sweat while doing it.

“It was good. I felt like I started out really well. Played really strong in the first set, and just kept building on that,” the American said.

“I feel like I can still improve and get better throughout this tournament, for sure. This is a good stepping stone for right now.”

Concerns over the conditions have dominated the build-up to the Australian Open, with smoke from bushfires making for dangerously low air-quality in Melbourne.

However, Williams says that it didn’t feel any different to any other year, although that can change day by day

“That is still a concern for pretty much everyone,” Williams added

“Every day all the players and the tournament make sure that all the players are updated on what the play conditions would be like.

“It’s literally every day, we are just waiting every day to see how the air quality would be.

“Today, it seemed normal. Yeah, it seemed pretty good.”

Elsewhere at the Australian Open, Serena Williams’ sister Venus Williams lost her opener to Coco Gauff, who also get the best of her at the same stage at Wimbledon last year.

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Michael Graham, Tennishead.net Editor, has been a professional sports journalist for his whole career and is especially passionate about tennis. He's been the Editor of Tennishead.net for over 5 years and loves watching live tennis by visiting as many tournaments as possible. Michael specialises in writing in-depth features about the ATP & WTA tours.