LONDON \u2014 Tennis legend Serena Williams made a triumphant return to the courts on Tuesday, with a big assist from Canadian rising star Victoria Mboko.<\/p>\n
The 44-year-old Williams and the 19-year-old Mboko teamed up to beat New Zealand’s Erin Routliffe and Nicole Melichar-Martinez of the United States 7-6 (2), 6-2 in a doubles first-round match at the HSBC Championships grass-court tennis tournament.<\/p>\n
Williams received a rousing ovation from the fans at The Queen’s Club in West London when she took the court for her first competitive match in over four years.<\/p>\n
The 23-time singles Grand Slam champion, who also won 14 major doubles titles with her sister Venus, served for the match and set up match point with an ace.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel very honoured to play with Serena,\u201d Mboko said in an on-court interview, standing next to Williams. \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
Mboko, who has already entered the top 10 in the rankings at No. 9, made an impression on her legendary partner.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was so fun. I had so much fun playing with Victoria,\u201d Williams said. “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
Later, though, Williams gave herself a modest grade in her post-match news conference.<\/p>\n
\u201cA C-minus,\u201d Williams said. \u201cWith all the elements, considering coming back on grass is probably not the easiest surface. … Grass, four years. Overall, I think it was decent.\u201d<\/p>\n
Perhaps more than decent, given the quality of the opposition. Routliffe is a two-time U.S. Open champion in doubles with Ottawa’s Gabriela Dabrowski, and Melichar-Martinez has made the doubles final at both Flushing Meadows and Wimbledon.<\/p>\n
Mboko was clearly impressed.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought she was moving great,\u201d said Mboko. \u201cThere was that one shot you hit, remember, you were on the run, on the backhand, and I was like, \u2018Oh, my gosh, she\u2019s got it.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Routliffe, who has played with several partners this year after she and Dabrowski ended their successful partnership after last season, was seeded third with Melichar-Martinez at Queen’s Club.<\/p>\n
Williams and Mboko, from Burlington, Ont., will next face Leylah Fernandez of Laval, Que., and Germany’s Laura Siegemund, who advanced to the doubles second round with a 6-2, 2-6, 11-9 win over Russia’s Alexandra Panova and Demi Schuurs of the Netherlands.<\/p>\n
Fernandez formed a fan-favourite duo with Venus Williams last year, and the pair made a run to the U.S. Open quarterfinals.<\/p>\n
Earlier, Fernandez was eliminated from singles competition with a 3-6, 7-6 (4), 7-5 loss to Britain’s Katie Boulter.<\/p>\n
Fernandez, the eighth seed at The Queen’s Club in West London, was up a set and tied 3-3 in the second when the match was suspended Monday night due to darkness.<\/p>\n
Boulter shook off the disruption when the match resumed to win a competitive second set.<\/p>\n
Fernandez fought back from a break down in the third set, but her service game faltered again with the set tied 5-5 as Boulter regained the lead. The Briton then served out for the win.<\/p>\n
Boulter will next face Romania’s Jaqueline Cristian.<\/p>\n
It was the first meeting between the players in a WTA Tour main draw. Boulter defeated Fernandez in qualifying at the 2018 Canadian Open in Montreal, and Fernandez returned the favour in qualifying at the 2023 Citi Open in Washington.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LONDON \u2014 Tennis legend Serena Williams made a triumphant return to the courts on Tuesday, with a big…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":726081,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[49,48,82,593],"class_list":["post-726080","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/726080","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=726080"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/726080\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/726081"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=726080"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=726080"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=726080"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}