Tiger Woods Cheers Serena Williams To US Open Victory

Tiger Woods said it was “a privilege to watch greatness” after cheering Serena Williams into the third round of the US Open at Flushing Meadows.

Williams, playing in her final US Open at the age of 40 having announced she is “evolving away” from tennis, rolled back the years to knock out second seed Anett Kontaveit in front of a star-studded crowd at the Arthur Ashe Stadium in New York. Fellow sporting legend Woods, with girlfriend Erica Herman and sitting two seats over from Serena’s sister Venus, fist-pumped and yelled encouragement for his fellow legend.

Tiger is not only a Serena fan, he has helped inspire the 23-time Major singles champion to continue in the game. She said: “He's one of the reasons I’m here, one of the main reasons I’m still playing. We talked a lot. He was really trying to get me motivated. There’s a few people, but we were like, 'OK, we can do this together’.

“It was good, because I didn’t know what I wanted to do. I was just lost, so many questions. When you can rely on someone like that – I mean, my goodness, he’s Tiger Woods – it was really helpful to get clarity.”

Williams, who won the first of her six US Open titles in 1999, beat Estonian Kontaveit 7-6 2-6 6-2 and faces Australian Ajla Tomljanovic in the third round on Friday. She came into her final US Open ranked 605th in the world, but cheered on by Tiger, her sister Venus and a plethora of famous faces, including Gladys Knight, Spike Lee, Billie Jean King, Mike Tyson and Anna Wintour, the fairytale finish to one of the all-time great tennis careers is still on.