Now the 44-year-old American legend will \u200cmake a stunning \u200breturn to singles after being handed \u200bthe final wild card by the All England \u200bClub on \u2060Sunday.<\/p>\n
“This \u200bis not a drill,” the tournament wrote in a \u200cpost on its Instagram account.<\/p>\n
Instagram<\/p>\n
This content is provided by Instagram, which may be using cookies and other technologies. Unfortunately we have been unable to verify if you have consented to Instagram cookies. Enable Cookies<\/a> Monterosa<\/p>\n This content is provided by Monterosa, which may be using cookies and other technologies. Unfortunately we have been unable to verify if you have consented to Monterosa cookies. Enable Cookies<\/a> Williams, widely-regarded as the greatest female tennis player \u200cof all time, last played a singles match at Wimbledon as a wild card in 2022, losing to Harmony Tan in round one.<\/p>\n After that \u200cyear’s US Open she said she would “evolve away from tennis” although never officially retired.<\/p>\n Williams first appeared at Wimbledon in \u200b1998, reaching the singles third round.<\/p>\n She won the title for \u200bthe first time in 2002, beating older sister Venus in \u2060the final, and went on to become the dominant force in the women’s game, spending a combined total of 319 weeks as the WTA \u2060world No 1.<\/p>\n Williams added singles crowns in \u200b2003, 2009, 2010, 2012, 2015 and 2016 and also won \u200bsix doubles titles at the grass-court major with Venus.<\/p>\n Serena has been practising at Wimbledon having posted a video on Instagram on Thursday showing her at Wimbledon’s Aorangi Park practice courts along with daughters Olympia and Adira.<\/p>\n The American ended nearly four years away from the match court last week, winning her first contest at Queen’s alongside Victoria Mboko before the Canadian’s unfortunate injury curtailed their run.<\/p>\n She then headed to Berlin but suffered a first-round loss at the WTA Tour event playing with Karolina Muchova.<\/p>\n Wild cards are handed out by tournament organisers to players whose rankings do not permit automatic entry and are usually reserved for home \u2060players, those with illustrious career records or high-profile players \u200breturning from injury.<\/p>\n \n Why Serena is the GOAT\n <\/p>\n Over the course of her game-changing career to date, Williams, who is now 44 years, nine months old, spent 319 weeks as the WTA world No 1.<\/p>\n Her haul of 73 singles titles, including 23 Grand Slam trophies won over an 18-season period, is the Open era record.<\/p>\n The winner of 39 major titles overall, as well as multiple Olympic medals, she remains the only player to achieve a \u2018career Golden Slam\u2019 in singles and doubles (meaning she won both events at all four majors as well as the Olympic Games) and is the prize money leader in women\u2019s sports.<\/p>\n Murray not surprised by Williams’ Wimbledon return <\/p>\n Image: Andy Murray revealed he was not surprised by Williams’ return to Wimbledon after a conversation between the pair at last year’s Miami Open.<\/p>\n Murray, who played alongside Williams in the 2019 Wimbledon mixed doubles, recalled a conversation between the pair with Williams opening up about missing top-level tennis.<\/p>\n “She asked if I missed playing,” Murray told the BBC. “I was like, ‘not at all, to be honest’.<\/p>\n “She said, ‘yes, I miss it every single day. I absolutely loved competing and playing. If I could, I’d be back out there again’.”<\/p>\n On the prospect of his own return, Murray said: “As much as I would love to, I don’t think I’d physically be capable of doing that.<\/p>\n “I haven’t missed the sport enough yet to want to get on the court and even hit tennis balls.<\/p>\n “I don’t mind hitting the occasional ball if it’s required on the practice court, but I don’t think the 44-year-old me will be competing.”<\/p>\n Watch the ATP and WTA Tours, live on Sky Sports or stream with NOW<\/a> and the Sky Sports app<\/a>, giving Sky Sports customers access to over 50 per cent more live sport this year at no extra cost. Find out more here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Serena Williams has been handed the final Wimbledon singles wild card into the women’s main draw as she…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":717921,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4,450,451,3,452,453],"class_list":["post-717920","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news","tag-breakingnews","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/717920","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=717920"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/717920\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/717921"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=717920"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=717920"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=717920"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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\n Allow Cookies Once<\/a><\/p>\n![\"Andy](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/skysports-andy-murray-serena-williams_6618874.jpg\")
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\n Andy Murray and Serena Williams played in the mixed doubles together at Wimbledon in 2019<\/p>\n