Injured Venus calls time on her AO dream

Venus Williams on Saturday pulled out of the Australian open with an unexplained and undefined injury.

The 42-year-old who played the first of her two finals at Melbourne Park in 2003, lost this week in the second round of the rain-scarred Auckland WTA event.

The veteran made no secret of her displeasure of being forced indoors by poor Kiwi weather onto a dodgy indoor court for the second round match she lost to China’s 84th-ranked Zhu Lin.

Williams gave no detail of her reasons, with theOopen issuing a terse tweet: “”Venus Williams has withdrawn from the Australian Open due to an injury sustained at the ASB Classic in New Zealand.”

The two matches for Williams this week were her first on the WTA since crashing out in the US Open first round four months ago.

Bill Scott

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