{"id":16931,"date":"2026-06-09T20:47:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-09T20:47:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/16931\/"},"modified":"2026-06-09T20:47:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-09T20:47:10","slug":"serena-williams-gets-a-doubles-win-in-first-match-in-nearly-four-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/16931\/","title":{"rendered":"Serena Williams gets a doubles win in first match in nearly four years"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Serena Williams<\/a> is back.<\/p>\n

And so is her blistering serve.<\/p>\n

After almost four years away<\/a> from the sport, the 44-year-old tennis legend made a triumphant return Tuesday at Queen\u2019s Club in London. She teamed with Canadian teenager Victoria Mboko for a 7-6 (2), 6-2 victory against Nicole Melichar-Martinez of the United States and Erin Routliffe of New Zealand in an opening doubles match at the grass-court HSBC Championships.<\/p>\n

Williams recorded service winners of up to 120 mph during her first professional match since the 2022 U.S. Open.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was so fun,\u201d Williams said afterward in an on-court interview. \u201cI had so much fun playing with Victoria. She really was able to hold up the team and really play big on the big points. I could really rely on her. We\u2019ve never played together, but it just felt so natural playing with her.\u201d<\/p>\n

Williams has won 14 Grand Slam titles and three Olympic gold medals in doubles, all with sister Venus Williams as her playing partner. <\/p>\n

\"Serena <\/p>\n

Serena Williams and Victoria Mboko of Canada wave to the crowd after defeating Nicole Melichar-Martinez and Erin Routliffe on Tuesday at the Queen\u2019s Club in London.<\/p>\n

(Alberto Pezzali \/ Associated Press)<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel very honored to play with Serena,\u201d Mboko said. \u201cI had a lot of fun, if anything. We really did that out there. I\u2019m so happy to be playing beside you. And we\u2019re going for more.\u201d<\/p>\n

In September 2022, Williams had registered as retired with the International Tennis Integrity Agency. <\/p>\n

Last December, however, Williams reentered the agency\u2019s drug-testing pool, a move that led to speculation<\/a> about a possible return for the 23-time Grand Slam singles champion. She announced her professional tennis return<\/a> last week as a wild-card doubles entry at the Queen\u2019s Club tournament. <\/p>\n

Days later, Williams was added to the 16-team doubles field<\/a> at Germany\u2019s WTA 500 event. <\/p>\n

\u201cI had nothing better to do,\u201d Williams said Tuesday. \u201cI got tired of sitting at home. My kids are out of school for the summer, so why not?\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Serena Williams is back. And so is her blistering serve. After almost four years away from the sport,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16932,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[6800,3222,6797,6241,6798,6796,1310,6799,6801,4625,122,28,6802,4620,282,2820],"class_list":["post-16931","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-16-team","tag-club","tag-double-win","tag-erin-routliffe","tag-field","tag-first-match","tag-germany","tag-grass-court-hsbc-championships","tag-new-zealand","tag-queen","tag-serena-williams","tag-tennis","tag-triumphant-return-tuesday","tag-williams","tag-wta","tag-year"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16931","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16931"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16931\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16932"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16931"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16931"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16931"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}