Tennis: Us Open: Sharapova Defeat Sums Up the New Fragility

Women's tennis is currently in a state of considerable flux, with injuries, loss of form and, in the case of the Williams sisters Serena and Venus, sundry other distractions having destroyed, albeit perhaps temporarily, the old certainties.

There was always a high possibility that Russia's 17-year-old Maria Sharapova would not be able to sustain her Wimbledon form here, and her 4-6, 6-2, 6-3 third-round defeat by France's Mary Pierce constituted a surprise rather than a shock.

"Grass is a totally different story. It's hard to compare your game with any other surface," said Sharapova, thereby reiterating a truism that might be said to sum up neatly the root problem of British tennis, which is annually compromised by a clutch of home victories on grass which are meaningless in the context of the rest of the year.

Compromises of a different nature were cited by Venus Williams for her rather steady decline - no grand slam title since the 2001 US Open - after her third-round victory over her fellow American Chanda Rubin.

"I'm just now starting to get healthy," said Williams. "A lot of times this year I've played while being injured. That hurt my game a lot and put me back. Today was really the first day that I started to feel a lot more like I did before all the injuries and what have you."

It has been the "what have yous" - namely a lack of commitment and the consequent vulnerability - which most would claim to be the real reasons behind Williams' fall from the No1 position. Her new resolve, if such it is, will be further tested in the next round by Lindsay Davenport, who reached the last 16 with a 7-6, 6-2 win over Russia's Elena Bovina.