Serena Williams shuts down comeback talk

Serena Williams quickly quashed hopes that she’ll make a comeback in professional tennis after her request to reenter the sport’s anti-doping test pool was widely reported Tuesday.

Speculation was rife that Williams would return after her name was found in the testing pool. Anyone who reenters the pool needs to be in it for six months before playing a tournament, and The Athletic’s Matthew Futterman found that she’d been in the pool since at least Oct. 6. That meant she could’ve been available to play from April 2026.

“She has notified us that she wants to be reinstated into the testing pool,” Adrian Bassett, a spokesperson for the International Tennis Integrity Agency, said in a text message earlier Tuesday, per Futterman.

“I do not know if this means she is coming back, or just giving herself the option. All I can say is she’s back in the pool and therefore subject to whereabouts.”

Williams explored a comeback weeks before the U.S. Open last summer but there wasn’t enough notice to rubber-stamp her participation, according to tennis reporter Ben Rothenberg. She was expected to play doubles with her sister, Venus Williams, at the tournament.

The 44-year-old, who has a record 23 Grand Slam titles in women’s tennis, last played in September 2022. She applied for official retirement with the International Tennis Integrity Agency a day after her third-round loss to Ajla Tomljanovic at the U.S. Open.

Venus returned to the tour at 45 last summer after more than a year away. She said in July that she wished Serena was along for the ride.

“I keep saying to my team: The only thing that would make this better is if she was here. Like, we always did everything together, so of course I miss her,” Venus told reporters, according to Howard Fendrich of The Associated Press. “But if she comes back, I’m sure she’ll let y’all know.”

Venus became the second-oldest woman to win a tour-level singles match in professional tennis two days after that news conference.

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