Serena Williams is poised to make a dramatic return to singles competition at Wimbledon.
The 44-year-old American, seven of whose 23 grand slam titles have come on the lawns of the All England Club, has been awarded the final remaining wildcard for the women’s draw.
Williams’ last competitive appearance as a singles player came at the US Open in 2022, when she was beaten in the third round by Australia’s Ajla Tomljanovic. Notably, she stopped short of saying she was retiring, insisting that she was simply “evolving away” from tennis.
Williams’ return marks the culmination of a slow-burning saga that began last October, when her re-entry to the drug-testing pool, a necessary precursor to any competitive comeback, became the focus of feverish speculation.
She played down that conjecture until the start of this month, when she announced she would play doubles with Victoria Mboko at Queen’s Club. The partnership lasted just one match before an injury forced the Canadian teenager to withdraw from the event.
Williams continued her comeback in Berlin, where she lost in the first round of the doubles alongside Karolina Muchova, the Czech world No 11. The outcome notwithstanding, that appearance, which came hard on the heels of the announcement that she would compete in the women’s doubles at Wimbledon with her sister Venus, 46, left Williams optimistic about the state of her game.
What has Serena Williams said about her level since returning to tennis?
“I felt pretty good out there,” she said. “I felt actually more nimble and sturdy and quicker than the first match at Queens. Overall I felt pretty good, just physically and quickness, which I think you need a lot of on grass.”
WIlliams added that it would be “fun” competing with Venus in SW19, where the sisters have claimed the doubles title six times. But she remained evasive when asked if she would be interested in taking up the final singles wildcard if it were offered.
“Would you be interested that I took it?” she replied to her interrogator. “Do you think I’m ready for singles? I need to get to work. That’s the question of the hour. I don’t know, I don’t know.”
That stance has clearly changed over the past five days. But while it will be fascinating to see Williams she fares, the odds remain stacked against a deep run. She has not won a singles match at the All England Club since 2019, when she was trounced in the final by Simona Halep, and it remains to be seen how she will cope with the more onerous physical demands of competing one-on-one. That said, if history has taught us anything, it is that writing off the great American is a fool’s game.