Forced to Pull Some of Her Punches, Williams Is Knocked Out Early Martin Bureau/Agence France-Presse - Getty Images Venus Williams, who lost to Urszula Radwanska in three sets, said, "My strategy was more or less to put the ball in, and that's very difficult for me, too, because that's not who I am." PARIS - On another day, in a different time, Venus Williams would have dispatched Urszula Radwanska the way big sisters send little sisters away. But Williams, now nearing the end of her career, has not been the dominant sister even in her own sibling match for years and Radwanska, with many more years to go, happens to be the younger sister of Agnieszka Radwanska, the fourth seed here. Urszula may never usurp Agnieszka in the tennis hierarchy the way Serena Williams did Venus, but in the first round of the French Open on Sunday, in a battle of struggling sisters, Urszula was the healthier and younger, if not more gifted, one. And as dusk arrived on the first day of matches, it seemed to cast the most darkness on Williams, who lost to Radwanska, 7-6 (5), 6-7 (4), 6-4. The reputations say it was an upset. The reality indicates it was not. Radwanska is ranked 37th, just behind Williams, who is 30th. But Radwanska's back has not ached for months as Williams's has, causing her to play and lose just one match on red clay this year before this one and slowing her serve and her movement. Radwanska's legs, not worn down by injury and illness, stayed fresher through 3 hours 19 minutes of poor serving, erratic ground strokes and skittish nerves. When it was over, Williams was reflective, and the strain of her back injury and her frustration with her inability to prepare properly showed most. She appeared to tear up several times but said she would play on, perhaps in some of the tuneup matches on grass she has typically avoided ahead of Wimbledon, because she wants to work out kinks, believing that better days like the ones she used to have with regularity will come again. "With what I've gone through, it's not easy," she said. But I'm strong and I'm a fighter. You know, I don't think I'm just playing for me now. I think I'm playing for a lot of people who haven't felt well. I think for me today it's a positive to be able to play three hours. I'm constantly finding ways to get better and to feel better. She mentioned that every player eventually retires but that she wasn't yet ready to give up. "I wouldn't just give up just because it was difficult," Williams said. That's not me. So my thing is that I'm going to keep continue trying. I had a very challenging year last year, but I had many successes, as well. So I'm continuing to look forward to more successes. Perhaps those will come on grass and hardcourts, where she has had her greatest moments. Williams has never won the French Open, losing to Serena in 2002 in her only singles final. Last year, she was defeated by Agnieszka Radwanska in the second round, but she also hadn't lost here in the first round since 2001. And while she displayed an unusual amount of emotion during the match, yelling in self-exhortation, and summoned the paint-the-lines brilliance of her stronger days in a second set tiebreaker that she rallied to win, it was not enough to end a skid that is sending her into the twilight of her playing days. Her most recent title came last October, in Luxembourg. That second set tiebreaker could serve as one of Williams's last gasps in the game's biggest events, a furious comeback from 0-4 down with seven consecutive points of her familiar accuracy. But it also seemed to sap her energy reserves. Williams, who has an autoimmune disease, quickly lost the first four games of the third set. Although she got back to 4-5, it was two unforced errors that gave Radwanska her two match points, with Williams's final backhand dumped into the net. It might have been the last point Williams plays on French clay. When asked directly if it was, Williams said that if that were the case, she would let everyone know. But Williams also acknowledged that the inflammation in her lower back means she cannot serve hard without great pain. She does not believe she can injure herself further as long as she serves softly. But having to serve softly does not just make her vulnerable to her opponents returns, it affects her own mentality. "My strategy was more or less to put the ball in, and that's very difficult for me, too, because that's not who I am," Williams said. But that's all I had. Williams said it was a challenge to be conservative while serving but aggressive once the points began. "You have to suddenly change your mind-set," she said. That's a little challenging. She added: "I want my serve back. I'm going to try to get it back for Wimbledon. Serena Williams, after her first-round victory but before Venus's match, marveled at the wonder of sisters playing high-level tennis, at how "cool" it was that sisters could push each other, and know exactly what the other was going through, what it was like to have someone who was in exactly the same position. But really, neither the Radwanskas, who are much younger, nor Serena, who might be playing the best tennis of her career at age 31, are in Venus's position. While Serena, who sat in the evening chill watching Venus, is the heavy favorite to win the tournament after a first-round loss here last year seemed to ignite her, Venus has not gotten past the fourth round in a Grand Slam since the 2010 United States Open. And her body is bedeviling her, making it fair to wonder how much longer the winner of 44 titles and more than $28 million in prize money will choose to play, with less than a month to go before her 33rd birthday. That seemed to be a question for another day. Venus Williams said she wanted to play the French Open in the hope that she could play her way into the tournament. It was not to be. She left the room and perhaps the French Open forever with a small smile of resignation and with an unknowable tennis future. "I'm just trying to handle defeats better because it's no fun having a bad attitude about it, so I try to move on," she said. It helps if you had some wins in the past, too. Those keep you warm at night. I have a lot of wins under my belt that help me feel better. So that helps. It would be horrible if I had never won anything. That would make it worse.