Serena Williams is planning to make her anticipated return to competitive tennis at Queen’s Club next month. Four years after the 23-time Grand Slam singles champion departed the sport at the 2022 US Open, Williams is set to play doubles at the WTA 500 event in London.
Nothing has yet been finalised, but the 44-year-old has been free to return to competitive tennis since 22 February, having completed six months back in the drug testing pool. Williams would need a wildcard to enter, and two are available for the grass court event which begins on Monday, 8 June.
The Served podcast, hosted by former men’s world number one Andy Roddick, has claimed Williams would partner 19-year-old Canadian Victoria Mboko at Queen’s, though BBC Sport has not been able to confirm this.
Patrick Mouratoglou, who coached Williams to 10 of her 23 major titles, is not thought to be part of her team. Her long-time hitting partner Jarmere Jenkins and Rennae Stubbs — a former Australian doubles player who coached Williams at the 2022 US Open — are likely to work with her.
One of the two available doubles wildcards at Queen’s is reserved for a team which includes a former world number one, a Grand Slam champion from the past 10 years, or a current top-30 player.
Wimbledon, where Williams has won seven singles and seven doubles titles, begins three weeks after Queen’s.
Williams holds 23 Grand Slam singles titles — the most by a woman in the Open era and second-highest all-time among women, behind Margaret Court. She also won 14 major doubles titles alongside her sister Venus, and the pair claimed three Olympic golds in the discipline.
Williams had resisted the term “retirement” in 2022, saying she was “evolving away” from the sport. Her final match was a third-round loss to Australia’s Ajla Tomljanovic at the 2022 US Open. Her last Grand Slam singles title came at the 2017 Australian Open.
Her potential return has coincided with months of public discussion about her weight loss. In an interview on the Today Show in the US, Williams spoke about losing 31lb (14kg) over eight months, describing her extra weight as “an opponent” and saying she had to “try something different” despite training five hours a day. She would not specify which weight loss medication she was taking, though she had recently become a spokesperson for Ro, a company that sells GLP-1 brands including Wegovy and Zepbound through its weight-loss programme. Her husband, Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian, is also an investor in the company.
In a follow-up Today Show interview in January, Williams said she was “going to see what happens” regarding a comeback.
The Lawn Tennis Association has consistently prioritised British players for wildcards at domestic grass court events. All four singles wildcards are expected to go to British players, but the LTA is likely to take a different view on the doubles given the circumstances of a potential Williams return.
Source: Serena Williams set to return at Queen’s Club after two-year absence