A lot of people still think of Richard Williams as a loony tennis dad. They see him chatting to passers-by at Wimbledon, filming Venus from his seat on Centre Court, semaphoring his encouragement to Serena, or doing something even crazier, such as holding up handwritten signs, and they think they know what he's about. But Venus's success at Wimbledon, coupled with Serena's win in the Australian Open at the beginning of the year, tells us that he and his former wife, Oracene Price, are almost certainly, given the circumstances in which they began his project, the most successful sporting parents in history. The key evidence is the relationship between Venus and Serena, who have travelled the world together for most of the past 10 years and seem, if possible, even closer than they were when we first saw them as teenagers. And it would not be too much of an exaggeration to say that on Saturday, as she swept to her fourth title at the All England Club, Venus was winning it for Serena.
She hated it when her little sister was criticised for the way she coped with her injury in the fourth round against Daniela Hantuchova. Venus did not say it, but she would not have been wrong to have detected an undertone of racism in the suggestions that Serena had not, in fact, been injured when she lay screaming in pain on the turf during the second set, which she eventually lost on a tiebreak before coming back after a rain interruption to remove her opponent. Once they had started winning major tournaments and fulfi lled their father's prophecy by topping the women's rankings, the sisters have occasionally seemed to need the stimulus of real or imagined adversity. Serena arrived in Melbourne ranked in the 80s and simply blitzed the tournament. Venus came to Wimbledon with no kind of form and played as badly as she has ever done in the fi rst round before gradually unwrapping her very best game.
While admiring Serena's competitive ferocity, I confess to an enduring weakness for Venus. When I first interviewed her, 10 years ago last month, it was the day before her 17th birthday. Her Wimbledon debut was a fortnight away, the entry confirmed only after she had met her father's insistence on A-plus grades at school.
At that stage he was keen to keep his daughters out of the tennis hothouse and to see them grow up as normal children. "They eat ice cream and hot dogs," he said, "they go to the movies and they go to the beach, just like other girls of their age. They can start worrrying about physical preparation when they're in the top 10." He also said he wanted them "out of tennis by 23, 24 years old", but that piece of advice seems to have been ignored. Back in the summer of 1997, Venus was talking about becoming an astronaut, an archaeologist or maybe an architect. Hmm, I remember thinking, that's just the As. But even though she and her sister have pursued interests away from tennis - interior design for Venus and fashion and acting for Serena - they seem to have realised that you don't retire from sport until you're too old to win.
Perhaps the fact that they're good enough to win without eliminating everything but tennis from their lives is what makes people uneasy. It also happens to be the ultimate tribute to the vision of their remarkable parents.
No Pierce Brosnan but Mlle Bartoli would not say No to a leading man
It would be a shame to leave Wimbledon 2007 without saluting the contribution made by the losing fi nalist of the women's singles. This time last week few tennis fans outside the hard core knew of Marion Bartoli's existence; many have since been pleased to make her acquaintance, not least because of her admission to the BBC that the presence of Pierce Brosnan in the royal box had inspired her to come back from a set down to beat Justine Henin, the No1 seed, in their semi-final.
When French journalists pressed her to elaborate on the matter, she was so delightfully eff usive that her words are worth sharing with a wider audience. "Yes, yes! I saw him in the tribunes," she said, "and it did something to me to know that he was looking at me. He's easily my favourite actor - I could watch every one of his films 100 times through without a break. When I was making a mess of the first set, I told myself: 'It's not possible. He's here and you're playing like a spud! What sort of idea of you is he getting?' So his presence helped me to pick up my game and then, whenever I looked in his direction and saw him applauding, it warmed my heart. More than that - I felt that he was on my side, hoping I'd win. And afterwards I was introduced to him. He gave me a kiss. It was unbelievable. Pierce Brosnan, the most beautiful man I've ever seen, showing an interest in me!"
Alas, Brosnan wasn't able to return for Saturday's fi nal. Apparently he sent fl owers and a note instead. And after she had lost, Mlle Bartoli had her own way of expressing regret. "I'd love to have won," she said, "because I was looking forward to putting on a dress and going to the dinner with Federer or Nadal." Ah, those French girls . . . fickle to the last.
Argentina flavour pepped by Basile
If you have the relevant TV channel, try not to miss tomorrow night's Copa América semi-fi nal in which Mexico take on what may be the best team ever to represent Argentina. Better than 1978? Better than 1986? Very possibly. Thirteen goals in four games in the tournament so far is a measure of the football played by a team whose starting line-up features Juan Rom án Riquelme and Lionel Messi, and whose head coach can routinely bring on Carlos Tevez and Pablo Aimar as second-half substitutes.
Alfio Basile appears to be succeeding where his predecessor, José Pe kerman, so regrettably failed last summer, and his words after Sunday's 4-0 defeat of Peru, in which all the goals came after the interval, summed up the philosophy of a man who clearly values the artistry and imagination of the players at his disposal. "We played with lots of patience, moving the ball around the field," he said. "Then in the second half they [Peru] paid dearly for all the running around and pressuring." A man with his footballing priorities in the right order, wouldn't you say?
Millar's tell-tale sorrow
The Daily Mail outdid itself on Saturday, welcoming the Tour de France to London by "exposing" Robert Millar, the Scot who won the King of the Mountains jersey in 1984 and now lives quietly in an English village, apparently as a woman. It's an old story - or at least an old rumour - and contributed the only sour note to an otherwise astonishingly enjoyable weekend for sport. Millar, the only Briton to finish a Tour in a winning jersey of any colour, is an authentic hero with the right to live the rest of his life as he pleases. The Mail is a rag.