Venus Williams is a multiple-time Grand Slam champion, in singles and doubles. The American boasts five Wimbledon and two US Open singles titles, to go with a staggering 14 doubles crowns across all four Majors, all of them alongside younger Serena.

The siblings have won three Olympic Games doubles gold medals, while Venus is a singles gold medallist too, having gone all the way at the Sydney Games in 2000. But she is no longer the force she once used to be, of course.

In 2011, she was diagnosed with Sjogren’s Syndrome, a chronic systemic autoimmune disease which affects the entire body and is generally characterised by dry eyes, dry mouth, fatigue and joint pain. But typical of the spunk and spirit that have been the hallmark of a journey which began in October 1994, she refused to let it define her or her career.

Legend of longevity

Venus is now 45, has been on the circuit for nearly 32 years, and while she has clearly slowed down, she is showing no signs of stopping.

Last September, she reached the quarterfinals of the women’s doubles event at the US Open in the company of Leylah Fernandez. In a fortnight’s time, she will line up at the French Open alongside Hailey Baptiste, a 24-year-old fellow American, while waiting to see if she will be awarded a wildcard for the singles competition.

Singles play has increasingly gotten unrewarding for the superstar, who has won just seven matches on the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) Tour since the beginning of 2021 (her record is an unflattering 7-32).

Her last Tour win came in July 2025, and she is sitting on a 10-match losing streak. But for Venus, tennis is no longer about just winning or losing. It’s what she loves doing the most, hitting balls on a court, though there is a lot more to Venus Williams than just tennis.

Age is no barrier

Not unlike Cristiano Ronaldo, the Portuguese ace. With a small difference — winning still means the world to the 41-year-old.

Ronaldo has won just about everything there is to win — Premier League titles, LaLiga crowns, Champions League trophies, the Euro, Nations League and Ballon d’Or. He is now totally committed to winning a maiden league title in Saudi Arabia, where he has been representing Al Nassr since 2023.

He has scored 26 goals in 33 Saudi Pro League (SPL) fixtures this season and should wrap his hands around another trophy in a few days’ time, though everyone who is even remotely invested in football knows that the SPL title isn’t his ultimate goal.

That is the FIFA World Cup, where Portugal have never so much as made the finals. Ronaldo is primed for one last shot at the most coveted silverware in football when the World Cup begins in the Americas next month.

Portugal have the team to get there; if Ronaldo needs further inspiration (doubtful), he only has to think of the other great champion of his generation, Lionel Messi, whose persistence was finally rewarded four years ago in Qatar where Argentina defeated France on penalties.

Messi is 38 but as prolific as ever as he eyes a second crown; he was his country’s leading scorer with eight goals in the South American World Cup qualifying campaign and is primed for a sixth appearance at the sport’s flagship event.

Three champions – one 45, another 41, the third 38 – pursuing their passion and quest of excellence, driven by different ambitions but united by commitment.

Among pantheon of greats

Just like a 37-year-old (significantly younger than all bar Messi) who knows not what it is to go slow, who hasn’t heard of the phrase ‘take it easy’, who is consumed by his love for his sport and who is the ultimate role model for peers and younger generations alike.

On Wednesday night, Virat Kohli made a sparkling, record-extending ninth IPL ton. Okay, so ‘sparkling’ is redundant because he doesn’t make centuries of any other kind.

No one needs any proof, ever, that Kohli is anything but switched on; Wednesday was mere affirmation of the pride in performance that nestles in his lithe frame. That, and his unwavering desire to put team above everything else, no matter what.

Kohli was coming off a brace of ducks — rarer than hen’s teeth — in his previous two outings, which lasted a grand total of three deliveries. In one of those strange quirks, he had gone from not courting a nought for three years to suffering that indignity twice in as many knocks.

A zero is just that and nothing more, no reflection on an individual’s ability — Sunil Gavaskar was dismissed off the first ball of a Test three times, G.R. Vishwanath’s first Test innings read 0 — but in a number-driven game, it rankles, however infrequently it might come about.

Small wins matter

No one was more mindful of the need to get off the mark on Wednesday than Kohli. Not pressure, not reinforcement, but just that natural urge to get off the dreaded nought. So, when he nudged debutant left-arm pacer Saurabh Dubey for a single to mid-wicket off the last ball of the first over of Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s chase against Kolkata Knight Riders, he ‘celebrated’ the event with a first pump. How cute.

Kohli was playing to the gallery, of course, knowing that seldom had one run delighted so many. He must have been relieved that he had staved off the hat-trick (of zeroes), but he hadn’t taken guard just to get off the mark.

There was a match to be won, a job to be completed, a target to be chased down. And, as history will testify, no one is more adept at chasing down the target than the right-hander with a computer for a brain and with a game that can only remain an elusive mirage for mere mortals.

It’s no secret that Kohli is now only a one-format international (he has been for 12 months) and because that format (50-over cricket) isn’t as prevalent as the other two, he doesn’t have access to the same game-time as those involved in either Tests or T20 Internationals.

That means he, like Rohit Sharma, his successor as the National captain, must find ways to keep himself physically fit, mentally sorted and be on top of his game batting-wise. Both champions understand that they are under greater scrutiny than before, and than the others.

How they have responded is a lesson in self-motivation and the hunger and discipline that only rests with the truly driven.

Kohli is a camera-magnet, and he loves the attention. He is the consummate showman, able to switch on a dazzling smile and ditch it, all in the space of a fraction of a second. He loves engaging with the crowd — on his terms — and has been more animated this IPL season than ever before.

Truly one of a kind

He celebrates an opposition wicket like it is his first match, not his trillionth, and he still launches into awe-inspiring stroke-making with a silken touch and an innate orthodoxy that not even the supposedly unyielding demands of the 20-over game have impacted adversely.

He is electric on the field, is his worst critic when there is that almost impossible eventuality – a misfield – and runs between the wickets like he is still trying to make a name and establish himself, not like someone with 14,027 T20 runs (he became the fastest to that milestone in Raipur on Wednesday) or with more than 28,000 (and counting) international runs.

Kohli does everything (very, very well) in fast-forward mode without even attempting to do so. He makes the most difficult appear ridiculously commonplace and straightforward; maybe his batting should come with a disclaimer — ‘Performed by an expert, don’t try this at home’.

Even as he is still a student who, by his own admission, learns something new every day, he is also a senior statesman and a mentor, tags that he lives up to effortlessly. Indeed, minutes after his unbeaten 105 muscled the defending champions to the top of the table, Kohli found time – and the energy – for an extended one-on-one conversation with Angkrish Raghuvanshi, the KKR wicketkeeper-batter who had made a polished half-century earlier.

The young man hung on to every word, understanding the privilege of being privy to the thinking of someone who has been there, done that.

Hungry for more

Like Ronaldo and Messi, Kohli has a clear goal ahead of him — the next 50-over World Cup in about 17 months’ time in the Africas. A year and a half is a long time and so much can happen, but there is a sense of certainty that Kohli will leave no stone unturned if another chance to test himself against the best in the business still appeals to him.

And rest assured, he won’t be there merely for the ride.