Navratilova believes Serena Williams only had two rivals during prime: "Venus and Henin that's it"

Serena Williams has only had two rivals during her run at the top according to 18-time Grand Slam champion, Martina Navratilova.

While only facing her once in a Grand Slam final, she believes Justine Henin is the closest followed by her sister Venus with the latter being faced nine times in Slam finals.

As well as admitting there have been a lot of 'pretenders' who haven't worked out for a myriad of reasons e.g Victoria Azarenka.

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“I think Justine Henin would be the closest rival [for Serena]” explained Navratilova on the ‘The GOAT: Serena’ podcast.

“And of course her sister Venus [Williams]. But she wasn’t lucky enough to have a Chris [Evert] and there’s nothing you can do about that.”

“There were a lot of pretenders,” Navratilova added. “Victoria Azarenka looked like she was heading that way but that fizzled out and she got injured then she got pregnant. She beat [Serena] at the [US] Open a couple years ago but that was it.

“So, Venus and Justine that’s it.”