Serena Williams, 44, Accepts Wild Card for Doubles at HSBC Championships
Serena Williams, 44, will return to professional tennis next week in women's doubles at the HSBC Championships in London alongside 19-year-old Victoria Mboko.
BBC NewsSerena Williams accepted a wild card to compete in women's doubles at the HSBC Championships at Queen's Club in London. The 44-year-old will play alongside Victoria Mboko, a 19-year-old Canadian ranked ninth in the world in singles. The HSBC Championships run from June 8-14, 2026.
Williams has not indicated whether she intends to enter singles events or the Wimbledon main draw that follows later in the month. Williams retired in 2022 after her final appearance at the 2022 US Open. Her return comes 196 weeks after that match.
Williams holds 23 Grand Slam singles titles and four Olympic gold medals. She won seven singles titles and seven doubles titles at Wimbledon, the most recent singles title coming in 2016. She also won 14 Grand Slam doubles titles with Venus Williams, with the pair going undefeated in major finals, and won three Olympic doubles gold medals along with an individual gold at London 2012.
Williams completed a career Golden Slam in singles and doubles and won every singles major at least three times. She spent 319 weeks at the top of the world rankings and won 73 singles titles on the WTA Tour. Williams reached four major finals after returning from maternity leave with her first daughter in 2018 and also returned to the world's top 10.
She gave birth to her second daughter in 2023. Last year Williams lost 31lb (14kg) over eight months. She became a spokesperson for Ro, a company which sells GLP-1 brands like Wegovy and Zepbound. Her husband is Alexis Ohanian, founder of Reddit.
Victoria Mboko described Williams as her idol. John McEnroe said: "That would seem to be the logical next step. " Williams said: "Queen's Club feels like the perfect place to begin this next chapter.
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