NEW YORK — In her first public comments about the mysterious injury and surgery that forced her to miss this year's U.S. Open, Serena Williams told USA TODAY on Wednesday evening that she had surgery to repair a lacerated tendon on the top of her right foot July 15 at the Kerlan-Jobe Orthopaedic Clinic in Los Angeles a week after receiving 12 stitches in one foot and six in another when she was cut by glass at a restaurant in Munich.

The torn tendon, known as the extensor hallucis longus, was causing her right big toe to "droop," Williams said in an exclusive telephone interview from Los Angeles, where she is receiving physical therapy and resuming training.

"I came back to the United States from Germany and knew something was not right," Williams said. "My big toe was drooping, and I thought, 'My toe shouldn't be hanging like this.' I saw a specialist in New York and had an MRI, and he said I had a tendon that was torn.

He said I didn't necessarily have to fix it, but I'd have a droopy toe the rest of my life. I thought it over and decided it was better to have the surgical procedure, for my career and for my life."