Venus Williams and Serena Williams have qualified for the doubles event at the Sony Ericsson Championships - Doha 2009, set to take place for the second year in a row at the Khalifa International Tennis Complex in Doha, Qatar, from October 27 to November 1. The Williams sisters are the second team to qualify for the event, joining Cara Black and Liezel Huber. Singles players Dinara Safina, Serena Williams, Elena Dementieva and Caroline Wozniacki have already qualified for the singles event.
The world's Top 8 singles players and Top 4 doubles teams from the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour season will compete for the coveted title and a share of the record championships prize money of $4.55 million. "We are thrilled to be heading to Doha for the Sony Ericsson Championships," Serena Williams said. "I love playing doubles with Venus as we have so much fun on the court. This year we actually decided to put more emphasis on our doubles careers and going to Doha has been on our minds all season. I am thrilled to have an opportunity to compete at the Sony Ericsson Championships in both singles and doubles." 
"It has been extremely rewarding to win a number of big doubles titles with Serena this year," Venus Williams said. "While playing doubles with my sister is one of the best experiences for me, qualifying for the Sony Ericsson Championships as a team is a great accomplishment and we can't wait to get to Doha and take on the best doubles teams in the world." The Williamses' season includes titles at the Australian Open, Wimbledon and the US Open, also a Premier-level title in Stanford. Their only loss came at Roland Garros, to Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Nadia Petrova. The sisters are two of only three active players to have a complete career doubles Grand Slam (also Lisa Raymond). They are 10-0 lifetime in Grand Slam doubles finals and are the third-most successful Grand Slam doubles partnership of the Open Era, trailing only Martina Navratilova and Pam Shriver (21 majors) and Gigi Fernandez and Natasha Zvereva (14 majors).
"Venus and Serena are incredible singles players in their own right, but having them compete in the doubles in Doha will add a new exciting dimension to the Sony Ericsson Championships," said Stacey Allaster, Chairman and CEO of the Tour. "I wish Venus and Serena lots of luck at the year-end Sony Ericsson Championships." "We congratulate Venus and Serena on qualifying for the Sony Ericsson Championships for the first time in their career as a doubles team," said Aldo Liguori, Corporate Vice President and Head of Global Communications & PR for Sony Ericsson. "Venus and Serena had a terrific season and are playing incredible tennis together, winning four tournaments. Having them in Doha will add a lot of excitement to what promises to be a great finale to the season."- Article courtesy of Sony Ericsson WTA Tour
Tennis Superstar, Serena Williams, will be a guest on the Tyra Banks Show on Thursday, September 24th. Topics of discussion: Serena's fashion line, her new book ("On The Line") and "her man." Other guests for today's show include Football Star, Michael Strahan and Grammy Winner, Nelly Furtado. Check your local listings for time and station.
Serena Williams will be fined $10,500 for behavior deemed "unsportsmanlike conduct," and also for racket abuse after her obscenity-filled and aggressive reaction to a critical foot fault called during her 6-4, 7-5 U.S. Open semifinal loss to Kim Clijsters on Saturday night. There will also be further investigation of the incident according to a statement released by the U.S. Open, "The Grand Slam rule book also allows for an investigation to be conducted by the Grand Slam Committee Administrator to determine if the behavior of Ms. Williams warrants consideration as a Major Offence for which additional penalties can be imposed. This investigation has now begun." Williams earned $350,000 for her singles semifinal finish. 
Seemingly surprised by the depth and pace of Clijsters shots and seeing even some of her best shots come back with interest, Williams pulled the trigger prematurely at times in the first set and impatience cost her. Williams made successive backhand errors to drop serve and fall behind 2-4. The backhand is typically Williams' most reliable groundstroke, that the backhand betrayed her in the opening set as she committed 11 backhand errors compared to one for Clijsters. Father Richard Williams, sitting in the fourth row, held both palms out in a "calm down" gesture directed at his daughter. Williams relaxed her arm and ripped a series of returns to earn triple break point in the seventh game. Clijsters staved off three break points but on the fourth, Williams race up to a net cord shot and reifled a forehand winner down the line to break back for 3-4. A 115 mph serve down the middle followed by a forehand winner evened the set at 4-all. 
Realizing that first-set code violation set made the point penalty mandatory after her outburst at the end of the second set, Williams put her racquet down, walked around the net post and shook hands with Clijsters before leaving the court without a word. "The timing is unfortunate, you know," Clijsters said. "To get a point penalty at the time, it's unfortunate. But there are rules and like I said, it's just unfortunate that it has to happen on match point." It was a sad, stormy and ugly ending for Williams, who was outplayed in the opening set, but clawed her way back into the match in the latter stages of the second set. "It was not an immediate default. It was a point penalty given on match point," Earley said. "She had an earlier warning for racquet abuse. She was called for a foot fault. A point later she said something to the line umpire and it was reported to the chair and that resulted in a point penalty and it just so happened that was match point. It was a code violation for unsportsmanlike conduct." 
A calm and composed Williams met with the media about 15 minutes after the match concluded, conceding Clijsters played a high-quality match. "I think Kim played a wonderful match and I think I played good too," Williams said. "I think I could have played better and I actually feel like I can go home and I can actually do better, which I'm really excited about. There's someone out there that makes me want to go home and makes me want to work out and makes me want to run and do better. I can't wait to do that. I think that when I was down, I'm not the beggar like 'Please, please let me have another chance.' Because it was the rules and I play by the rules. If I get hit, I say I got hit, you know. I play by the rules. That's what it was."
