When Serena Williams was pushed to the brink by Britain’s Heather Watson early on in Wimbledon, many would have thought that there was no way she could come back and win the whole thing. She looked knackered, but she fought back to beat Watson and the partisan crowd to boot.

With crowd getting particularly rowdy, Williams did a finger wag and told them: “Don’t try me”.

And she was right. On Saturday, Williams won Wimbledon for the sixth time, her 21^st major. While this feat is remarkable in itself, what makes it more impressive is that she has done this aged 33, just a few months away from her 34^th birth. Now, for us mere mortals, 33 is positively spritely. For sportspeople, 33 is bordering on ancient. But Williams keeps on getting better the older she gets and she is the oldest player, either male or female, to hold the world number one ranking.

She has won more Grand Slam titles since turning 30 than Jimmy Connors, Ivan Lendl and Andre Agassi ever won. She has reached 25 Grand Slam finals and 28 semi-finals. Williams is, arguably, one of the most dominant athletes in an individual sport for the last decade and a half.

Her blistering serves and sheer destruction of her opponents through impeccable technique is something to behold. As an athlete, she is perfection, not just physically, but mentally too. She has won three Grand Slams after being down a match point. She has battled depression and clawed her way back from being number 95 in the world. She came back from a pulmonary embolism five years ago. The fact that she has kept going despite adverse conditions, both on the court and off, is impressive enough, the fact that she has come back and kept going at the top of her game is truly one of the most magnificent sporting achievements of modern day sport.

Her Wimbledon win took her on-court prize money to over $72 million, the most of any female athlete ever and the fourth among all tennis players. If women earned prize money equal to men, she would probably be in the top two. Williams was placed on this earth to kick ass and chew bubblegum and she has been out of bubblegum for 15 years.

But all her success has not come without struggles and detractors. Like many other sportspeople, she can be a poor and petulant loser. And, as if with many who achieve success, her detractors will zone in on her slip ups at every opportunity. The powerless lineswoman at the US Open a few years ago was, perhaps, the most famous example of her having a strop.

But even when she, rightly, has a pop at the unsporting Wimbledon crowd, detractors will find a way to be snide or use her completely human reaction as a way to undermine her. Often, these insults are steeped in racism and sexism. Granted, they mostly come from egg avatars on the internet, but as one blogger put it last week, and we’re paraphrasing a bit here, Williams’ whole existence is one that will troll the prejudice. If you’re racist and uncomfortable with a black woman kicking ass and taking names, too bad for you. If you’re sexist or a misogynist and uncomfortable with a woman being strong and powerful Williams will make you mad.

Williams’ size has also been the source of ridicule for many a troll. The bridge dwellers will have you believe that because she is physically far more powerful than her opponents, she has an unfair advantage. But Williams does not even want to lift weights, because she is self-conscious about how big she appears. Players like Maria Sharapova out-rightly says that she does not lift weights because she does not want to appear too big and she wishes she could “be skinner and have less cellulite”.

Bah humbug. The fact that Williams so consistently overpowers her opponents is tough on them, not her. Her appearance and strength has single-handedly redefined what is perceived as “feminine” and “beautiful” and while there are still many, many walls to break down as evidenced by the fact that Sharapova’s endorsement deals far outweighs Williams’, she has made great strides towards shifting perceptions.

“Serena has shown that you can be tough, you can be fearless, you can be courageous, you can be a competitor and you can still be a woman,” Lindsay Davenport said in an interview with the BBC.

“She was the most intimidating opponent I ever faced. With some players you would be intimidated by their record or their game, like with Steffi Graf. But with Serena you were scared by absolutely everything – her passion, her attitude, how she serves, the power she has, her athleticism.

“She plays tennis at a different level. She is better than any player on tour even if she is only at 80% – and I think she would still win a ton of matches at just 50%.”

And for those who don’t think that her simply being ace at tennis is good enough, she is a champion off the field too. She has built schools across Africa, she is studying medicine and she speaks four languages. Not that any of this matters because even she was only very good at playing tennis, she would still be a courageous competitor and champion for women across the globe. DM

Photo: Serena Williams of the USA celebrates winning against Garbine Muguruza of Spain during their final match for the Wimbledon Championships at the All England Lawn Tennis Club, in London, Britain, 11 July 2015. EPA/ANDY RAIN