Venus Williams’s losing streak in singles play has reached 13 matches. The seven-time major champion was defeated 6-2, 6-2 by Emiliana Arango late on Friday in the first round of the Cincinnati Open. The 46-year-old Williams received a wild-card entry to the WTA 1000 event.
She has not won a singles match since July 2025. Arango, a 25-year-old qualifier from Colombia ranked 95th, needed 1 hour, 5 minutes to defeat Williams on the grandstand court at Lindner Tennis Center. Williams had her serve broken in the first game of the match and faced an uphill battle the rest of the way.
Arango was 4 of 5 on converting break points and won 71 percent of her first-serve points. Williams was unable to convert on her lone break opportunity and was only 41 percent on first-serve points. And then I think I just did a good job of staying on it, trying to make her play as much as possible,” Arango said about getting ahead early.
Arango will face No 7 seed and defending Cincinnati champion Iga Swiatek in the second round. Williams’s last singles victory came last year in Washington, when she defeated Peyton Stearns. They last played doubles together at the 2022 US Open.
The Williams sisters were slated to play doubles at Wimbledon before an injury to Serena. They will play Marta Kostyuk and Peyton Stearns in the first round. The doubles portion of the tournament starts on Sunday.
I’ll be preparing for that,” Venus Williams said. Venus is also slated to play mixed doubles at the US Open later this month with Alexander Bublik.
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