Serena too hot for Venus to handle

By Martyn Herman

LONDON (Reuters) - Serena Williams can stomach her sister's name emblazoned on the singles trophy, she even accepted the smaller room in their rented house, but she put her foot down to snatch back the Wimbledon title on Saturday.

Her emphatic 7-6 6-2 victory over 29-year-old Venus to capture an 11th grand slam singles title on Independence Day will not make any classic Wimbledon compilation DVDs, but it was razor-sharp, ruthless and just too hot for her elder sibling.

Venus strode out on a sunlit Centre Court having not dropped a set at the grasscourt grand slam since the third round in 2007 and relinquished 19 games to reach the final this year.

She seemed poised to complete a hat-trick of women's singles titles last achieved by Steffi Graf in 1993 but in the end she was forced to play second fiddle in the 21st career meeting of the siblings since they took tennis by storm.

Later in the day, as the sun dipped down behind Centre Court's roof, Serena and Venus teamed up to win their fourth Wimbledon women's doubles title, defeating Samantha Stosur and Rennae Stubbs of Australia 7-6 6-4.

It was consolation of sorts for Venus, who has now lost six of the eight grand slam singles finals she has played against Serena, three of them at Wimbledon.

She had looked the more composed on Saturday until the first-set tiebreak, which Serena won with a sublime lob, but then seemed powerless as Serena blazed away to raise the Venus Rosewater Dish for a third time.

"I didn't think about Venus at all today. I just saw her as an opponent," said second seed Serena, who walked in to meet the world's media wearing a cheeky T-shirt asking "Are You Looking at My Titles?"