Serena Williams will return to competitive tennis for first time in almost four years
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- Serena Williams will return to professional tennis next month, ending almost four years away from competition with a doubles comeback at the HSBC Championships at London’s Queen’s Club.
- The 23-time Grand Slam singles champion, 44, received a wild-card entry into the doubles draw and is expected to partner with 19-year-old Canadian rising star Victoria Mboko.
- Williams is not known to have committed to more events, including Wimbledon.
Serena Williams is returning to competitive tennis after all.
Months after insisting on social media, “Omg yall I’m NOT coming back,” the 23-time Grand Slam singles champion announced Monday that she’ll play professionally for the first time in almost four years at the HSBC Championships at the Queen’s Club in London.
Williams, 44, has been given a wild-card entry into the doubles draw of the WTA 500 event, which begins June 8.
“Queen’s Club feels like the perfect place to begin this next chapter,” Williams said in a statement released by the tournament. “Grass has given me some of the most meaningful moments of my career, and I’m excited to be back competing on one of the sport’s most iconic stages.”
Naomi Osaka’s fashion statements depend on her on-court performance. A win earns her another grand entrance. A loss and nobody cares what she wears on the ride home.
Williams teased the announcement earlier Monday by posting a video on social media that featured her phone‘s notifications going off constantly while she seemingly was practicing on the court.
“Good news travels fast,” Williams wrote on the post.
Tournament director Laura Robson said during TNT Sports UK’s coverage of the French Open on Monday that Williams’ playing partner will be Canadian teenager Victoria Mboko, who is ranked No. 9 in WTA singles. Williams has won 14 Grand Slam titles and three Olympic gold medals in doubles with her sister Venus Williams as her partner.
It is not clear whether Williams will participate in any other events. Wimbledon, a Grand Slam event Williams won seven times in singles, begins June 29 in London.
Billie Jean King, 82, received her bachelor’s degree in history from the same school she attended more than 60 years ago and also gave a commencement speech.
Williams’ last professional match was a loss to Australian Ajla Tomljanovic in the third round of the U.S. Open on Sept. 2, 2002. She registered as retired with the International Tennis Integrity Agency the next day.
Last December, however, Williams reentered the agency’s drug-testing pool. According to the ITIA website, retired players “may not return to sanctioned events unless they have made themselves available for out-of-competition testing for at least six months prior to the event in question.”
The move led to much speculation about a possible Williams return, leading to her social media post denying any such intentions.
Martina Navratilova, the 18-time Grand Slam champion who is the oldest woman to win a tour-level singles match — she was 47 when she won a Wimbledon match in 2004 — expressed excitement for Williams’ return.
“Serena brought the game to another level and it is incredible for the sport that she’s pushing the boundaries and coming back,” Navratilova said in a statement released by the WTA. “To many of the younger players, they never had the opportunity to play her; some may have never watched her on television, so this will be a new and exciting experience.”
