Serena Williams played her first match since announcing her retirement but she lost in two sets to Belinda Bencic in Toronto.
The 23-time Grand Slam champion will do her best to fight for her 24th Grand Slam title at the 2022 US Open but it seems that it may be a very difficult task for Serena Williams. She defeated Nuria Parrizas-Diaz in Toronto, but the twelfth-seeded Belinda Bencic proved to be too strong for her.
Williams is trying to get to her top form before the 2022 US Open and she signed up for WTA 1000 events in Toronto and Cincinnati to do that. After losing to Harmony Tan at Wimbledon, she achieved her first win of the season against Nuria Parrizas-Diaz but her second match was less successful.
It was the first match that Serena played since announcing her retirement, but her opponent was just better. Neither Bencic nor Williams played their best tennis and despite the American showing some good signs, the match ended already in two sets.
Bencic won the first set after breaking her opponent twice and gained an early lead in the match. In the second set, Williams seemed much more solid, but she lost her serve in the seventh game and so she eventually lost the match 2-6, 4-6.
In her on-court interview after the match, Williams said: "I love playing here, I always loved playing here. I wish I could have played better but Belinda played so good today."
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