7 Months After Serena Williams’ Last Dance, Russian Tennis Rival Shows Pete Sampras Example as She Gets Real About Her Legacy

2014 marked the exit of former World No. 1 Dinara Safina from the women’s professional tennis. In the years leading up to the Russian’s retirement, injuries blighted her career. However, between 2008 and 2009, she was playing the finest tennis of her life. During this period, she reached the finals of the Australian and French Open. Her performances got her to the top of the WTA rankings as she overtook the likes of Venus and Serena Williams.

EssentiallySports recently had the privilege of sitting down with Safina and having an insightful conversation. During the conversation, Safina spoke at length on a wide variety of subjects. At an interesting point during the conversation, Safina had an intriguing answer to a question regarding Serena Williams’ retirement.

According to Safina, the retirement of Serena Williams wasn’t the end of an era

When Safina was at the peak of her powers, she had several encounters with Serena Williams who retired in 2022 to focus on business and family. These encounters gave Safina the opportunity to study Williams, who is widely regarded as the Open Era’s greatest tennis player. At a particular point during Safina’s interview with EssentiallySports, the host quizzed her about Serena’s retirement. “Do you feel like it’s an end of an era in the women’s game?”

Surprisingly, in Safina’s opinion, the answer is no. According to her, tennis fans often think of iconic players’ retirements as the end of  eras. However, she said, “Someone comes up and plays even better” when players from future generations emerge. Safina went on to say, “It’s always like this.”

The Russian also reminisced about the feelings among tennis fans when Pete Sampras was World No. 1 in the men’s game. “You remember when Pete Sampras was there when everybody was saying no chance that someone can win more Grand Slams than him and then you see Roger and then Rafa then Novak Djokovic.”

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Safina also stated that “tennis is improving” and its rate of improvement is much faster than how it was during her playing career.

How did Safina perform against Serena?

Safina’s most high-profile encounter against Serena came at the final of the 2009 Australian Open. Despite Safina’s valiant attempts at keeping Serena at bay, the American proved simply too good for the Russian. By the end of the match, Serena had registered a convincing victory and it barely took her an hour to beat Safina.

At the 2009 Wimbledon, Safina made it all the way to the semifinals. However, Serena’s elder sister Venus shattered Safina’s dream of getting into another Grand Slam final with a humiliating 6-1, 6-0 victory. In the aftermath of Safina’s loss, Serena questioned the Russian’s credibility as World No. 1. Ultimately, it was Serena, who was World No. 2 at the time, who took home the 2009 Wimbledon title.

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