{"id":410734,"date":"2026-01-13T20:26:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-13T20:26:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/410734\/"},"modified":"2026-01-13T20:26:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-13T20:26:11","slug":"venus-williams-exits-hobart-international-after-straight-sets-loss-to-tatjana-maria","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/410734\/","title":{"rendered":"Venus Williams exits Hobart International after straight-sets loss to Tatjana Maria"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tennis great Venus Williams has exited the Hobart International in the first round, with the 45-year-old wildcard losing in straight sets to Tatjana Maria.<\/p>\n

Williams went down 6-4, 6-3 to German sixth seed Maria in a match lasting 1 hour and 27 minutes on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

The match between Williams and Maria lasted 1 hour and 27 minutes. (ABC News: Ebony ten Broeke)<\/p>\n

The seven-time major singles champion, who is ranked 576 in the world, broke 38-year-old Maria in the opening set.<\/p>\n

But she dropped serve twice, handing the set to Maria, who sits at 42 on the WTA rankings.<\/p>\n

Service breaks were exchanged in the second set, however Maria did enough to clinch victory over former world number one Williams.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Venus Williams takes a break during her match. (ABC News: Ebony ten Broeke)<\/p>\n

Williams will now turn her attention to the Australian Open.<\/p>\n

She was awarded a wildcard into the main draw at Melbourne Park, where she has reached the singles final twice (2003 and 2017).<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Tatjana Maria pictured after the match. (ABC News: Kate Nickels)<\/p>\n

Preston gets career-best win in Hobart<\/a><\/p>\n

The 20-year-old wildcard, who is ranked 205 in the world, overpowered Spanish fifth seed J\u00e9ssica Bouzas Maneiro 6-4, 7-6 (7\/4) in 88 minutes.<\/p>\n

On both occasions, Williams lost to younger sister Serena, who won the Australian Open seven times.<\/p>\n

The senior Williams sibling has not played in Melbourne for five years and will break the age record held by Kimiko Date.<\/p>\n

Date was 44 years old when she contested the 2015 Australian Open.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Venus Williams speaks to the media after her loss. (ABC News: Kate Nickels)<\/p>\n

Williams played in Auckland last week, taking a set off world number 52 Magda Linette in an opening-round loss.<\/p>\n

She has not played outside North America since 2023, having battled health and injury problems.<\/p>\n

In other first-round results in Hobart, two-time major singles champion Barbora Krej\u010d\u00edkov\u00e1 lost to Peyton Stearns in a tense three-set match.<\/p>\n

\"People<\/p>\n

The crowd turned out for day two of the eight-day tennis tournament. (ABC News: Ebony ten Broeke)<\/p>\n

Czechia’s Krej\u010d\u00edkov\u00e1, ranked 55 in the world and unseeded in Hobart, went down to her American opponent 6-4, 1-6, 7-6 (7\/4).<\/p>\n

Stearns’s countrywoman and tournament third seed, Iva Jovi\u0107, advanced with a commanding 6-0, 6-1 defeat of Indonesia’s Janice Tjen 6-0, 6-1.<\/p>\n

ABC\/AAP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tennis great Venus Williams has exited the Hobart International in the first round, with the 45-year-old wildcard losing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":410735,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[64,63,6571,1533,195464,85,217299,747,11549,159412],"class_list":["post-410734","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australian-open","tag-first-round","tag-hobart-international","tag-sports","tag-tatjana-maria","tag-tennis","tag-venus-williams","tag-wildcard"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/410734","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=410734"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/410734\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/410735"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=410734"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=410734"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=410734"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}