{"id":243613,"date":"2026-06-01T15:43:27","date_gmt":"2026-06-01T15:43:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/2026\/06\/01\/serena-williams-announces-return-to-tennis-nearly-4-years-after-retirement\/"},"modified":"2026-06-01T15:43:27","modified_gmt":"2026-06-01T15:43:27","slug":"serena-williams-announces-return-to-tennis-nearly-4-years-after-retirement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/2026\/06\/01\/serena-williams-announces-return-to-tennis-nearly-4-years-after-retirement\/","title":{"rendered":"Serena Williams Announces Return to Tennis Nearly 4 Years After Retirement!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p><span class=\"span-reading-time rt-reading-time\" style=\"display: block;\"><span class=\"rt-label rt-prefix\">Reading Time: <\/span> <span class=\"rt-time\"> 2<\/span> <span class=\"rt-label rt-postfix\">minutes<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Hold on to your rackets, tennis fans! The GOAT is officially returning to the court!<\/p>\n<p>Yes, nearly four years after stepping away from professional tennis, Serena Williams has announced that she will return to competition, ending months of speculation and setting the stage for one of the most remarkable comebacks the sport has ever seen.<\/p>\n<p>Now 44, Serena has not played a professional match since her emotional farewell at the 2022 U.S. Open.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><noscript><\/noscript><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"682\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.thehollywoodgossip.com\/uploads\/2026\/06\/GettyImages-2275544991-1024x682.jpg\" alt=\"Serena Williams attends Netflix Is A Joke Festival Presents: The Roast of Kevin Hart at The Kia Forum on May 10, 2026 in Inglewood, California. \" class=\"wp-image-556185 lazyload\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.thehollywoodgossip.com\/uploads\/2026\/06\/GettyImages-2275544991-1024x682.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/cdn.thehollywoodgossip.com\/uploads\/2026\/06\/GettyImages-2275544991-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/cdn.thehollywoodgossip.com\/uploads\/2026\/06\/GettyImages-2275544991-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/cdn.thehollywoodgossip.com\/uploads\/2026\/06\/GettyImages-2275544991-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https:\/\/cdn.thehollywoodgossip.com\/uploads\/2026\/06\/GettyImages-2275544991-960x640.jpg 960w, https:\/\/cdn.thehollywoodgossip.com\/uploads\/2026\/06\/GettyImages-2275544991-1080x720.jpg 1080w, https:\/\/cdn.thehollywoodgossip.com\/uploads\/2026\/06\/GettyImages-2275544991-1200x800.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 760px) calc(100vw - 20px), 720px\" data-pin-media=\"https:\/\/cdn.thehollywoodgossip.com\/uploads\/2026\/06\/GettyImages-2275544991-scaled.jpg\" loading=\"lazy\" data-trellis-processed=\"1\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Serena Williams attends Netflix Is A Joke Festival Presents: The Roast of Kevin Hart at The Kia Forum on May 10, 2026 in Inglewood, California. <span class=\"image-caption-credit\"> (Photo by Gonzalo Marroquin\/Getty Images for Netflix)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Since then, she has focused on business ventures, family life, and raising her daughters.<\/p>\n<p>But it turns out her retirement wasn\u2019t quite permanent.<\/p>\n<p>Williams confirmed today that she will make her return at the Queen\u2019s Club Championships in London, where she is expected to compete in doubles alongside rising Canadian star Victoria Mboko. <\/p>\n<p>The event serves as a major warm-up tournament ahead of Wimbledon.<\/p>\n<p>The announcement follows months of rumors about Serena\u2019s possible return.<\/p>\n<p>Earlier this year, Williams quietly re-entered the International Tennis Integrity Agency\u2019s testing pool, a required step for any retired player seeking to return to competition. <\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"instagram-media\" data-instgrm-captioned=\"\" data-instgrm-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/reel\/DZC5f9ZRAuL\/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading\" data-instgrm-version=\"14\" style=\" background:#FFF; border:0; border-radius:3px; box-shadow:0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width:540px; min-width:326px; padding:0; width:99.375%; width:-webkit-calc(100% - 2px); width:calc(100% - 2px);\"\/>\n<p>At the time, she publicly denied that a comeback was in the works, telling fans on social media that she was \u201cNOT coming back.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Apparently, her plans changed. Or perhaps Serena simply wasn\u2019t ready to reveal them yet. Either way, the tennis world is buzzing.<\/p>\n<p>After all, we\u2019re talking about a player who captured 23 Grand Slam singles titles, spent more than 300 weeks ranked No. 1 in the world and transformed women\u2019s tennis in ways that are still being felt today. <\/p>\n<p>Many consider Williams the greatest player the sport has ever produced.<\/p>\n<p>The obvious question now is whether this return will be limited to doubles \u2014 or if something even bigger is coming.<\/p>\n<p>Some tennis analysts have already speculated that Wimbledon could be the next stop if her comeback goes well, especially given Williams\u2019 legendary success on grass courts. <\/p>\n<p>She won seven Wimbledon singles titles during her career and remains one of the most dominant grass-court players the sport has ever seen.<\/p>\n<p>For now, however, fans are simply celebrating the news.<\/p>\n<p>Because after nearly four years away, Serena Williams is heading back onto a professional tennis court.<\/p>\n<p>And that\u2019s a sentence many people never expected to read again.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><script async defer src=\"https:\/\/platform.instagram.com\/en_US\/embeds.js\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.thehollywoodgossip.com\/2026\/06\/serena-williams-announces-return-to-tennis-nearly-4-years-after-retirement\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Reading Time: 2 minutes Hold on to your rackets, tennis fans! The GOAT is officially returning to the court! Yes, nearly four years after stepping away from professional tennis, Serena Williams has announced that she will return to competition, ending months of speculation and setting the stage for one of the most remarkable comebacks the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":243614,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-243613","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-hollywood"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=243613"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243613\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/243614"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=243613"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=243613"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=243613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}