Serena Williams will return to professional tennis next week, ending a near four-year absence by entering the doubles draw at the HSBC Championships at Queen’s Club alongside 19-year-old Canadian Victoria Mboko.
The 44-year-old American, a 23-time Grand Slam singles champion and 14-time major doubles winner, has not played a tour-level match since the 2022 US Open, where her farewell run ended in the third round against Ajla Tomljanovic. She and Mboko, the world No. 9, were awarded a wild card into the 16-team doubles field at the West Kensington grass-court event, which runs June 8 to 14. The pairing carries a quarter-century age gap between them.
Mboko confirmed the partnership Thursday on social media, posting a photo of the two players standing together after a practice session in west London. She called it an honor to share the court with one of the sport’s greatest athletes and said she was even more excited to play doubles together. Williams was seen hitting on the grass courts the same day, her first public appearance on a competitive practice court in years.
THE COMEBACK. Speculation around a Williams return had been building since she re-entered the anti-doping testing pool last year, a procedural step required of any player wanting to compete on tour. She became eligible to play again as of February 22 following a mandatory cooling-off period, then trained intensively in Florida without indicating when, or whether, she would actually return. The Queen’s Club announcement, made earlier in the week, ended that uncertainty. Williams said grass had given her some of the most meaningful moments of her career and described the venue as the right place to begin the next chapter.
THE PARTNER. For Mboko, the partnership is the realization of a long-held admiration. The Canadian was 15 and largely still playing junior events when Williams stepped away in 2022, and she has spoken openly about idolizing the American. Speaking at Roland Garros last week, where she reached the third round before losing to Madison Keys, Mboko said she looked up to Williams and found it exciting that the older player even knew who she was. She added that the two have stayed in touch. Mboko will also contest the singles draw at Queen’s Club.
WHAT COMES NEXT. Williams has framed the Queen’s Club entry as the start of a wider return rather than a one-off. She announced she will also play doubles at the Berlin Tennis Open, which begins June 15, with a partner yet to be confirmed, saying every tournament added to her schedule right now feels significant. She has not committed to a singles return, nor said whether she intends to play Wimbledon or the US Open later in 2026. First-round women’s doubles matches at Queen’s Club are scheduled for Monday through Wednesday.
What precisely Williams hopes to achieve remains an open question. She has already won titles in every discipline, holds a career Golden Slam in both singles and doubles, and has earned more than $94 million in prize money across roughly three decades on tour. For now, the return begins on grass, in doubles, alongside a teenager who grew up watching her.
