Serena Williams, 44, Set for a Triumphant Tennis Comeback: Report

Serena Williams kept saying she was done. Now it looks like she might be un-retiring anyway, and in a very Serena way: by jumping straight into doubles with a partner who turns heads, at a tournament that raises a few eyebrows.

So, what actually got reported

On the Wednesday, May 27 episode of Andy Roddick's podcast 'Served,' he said Serena, 44, has asked for a wild card into the doubles draw at the Queen's Club Championships in London. Per the podcast, she plans to team with Canada’s world No. 9 Victoria Mboko, with play starting June 8.

The breadcrumbs that led here

• Serena kept insisting she was not coming back, even as signs piled up that something was brewing. The big one: late last year she re-entered the International Tennis Integrity Agency anti-doping testing pool.
• That pool comes with a mandatory six-month wait before you can compete again. She was confirmed to be in the pool on October 6, 2025 — which means that six-month clock should have run out sometime in the last couple of months.
• Her last official match was at the 2022 US Open, where Ajla Tomljanovic ended her run.
• When The Athletic reported in December that she was back in the testing pool, Serena jumped on X to swat it down. More on that below.
• In late January, she went on Today to talk about a Super Bowl ad for Ro and her weight-loss journey. Savannah Guthrie asked if the testing-pool move was step one of a comeback. Serena laughed it off — basically a playful 'Are you really asking me this here?' — and said she was just enjoying life. When Guthrie pressed that it sounded like a 'maybe,' Serena shot back that it was not a maybe.
• The day before that Today appearance, Porter ran an interview where Serena admitted that retirement has been harder to adjust to than she expected, even though she tried to prepare for it.
• She has also talked about the upside: more time with her family. On the May 13 episode of Michelle Obama and Craig Robinson's 'IMO' podcast, Serena said she is trying to be as present as possible for her daughters — Olympia, 8, and Adira, 2 — and very intentionally raise them the way she wants.

About that Queen's twist

One odd thing here: Queen's is traditionally a men-only ATP event, not a tour stop with a standard women's doubles draw. If Serena and Mboko are indeed popping up there on June 8, expect an explanation — special exhibition, one-off showcase, or some other wrinkle — when the tournament or the players make it official. The pairing itself is a headline; the venue makes it extra curious.

'Omg yall I'm NOT coming back. This wildfire is crazy.'

That was Serena on X after the December testing-pool chatter. If this doubles wild card happens, it would be a pretty sharp pivot from the public 'nope' she has been giving for months — but the timeline lines up with the anti-doping rules, and doubles is a lower-mileage way to test-drive a return.

Bottom line: if Roddick's scoop holds, circle June 8 in London. Serena might be back on a match court — not with a singles comeback speech, but with a doubles partner and a lot of questions that will answer themselves the moment she walks out to play.