Serena Williams has decided to skip her big Wimbledon doubles comeback after a tough medical update.
Serena Williams has announced she won’t be teaming up with her sister Venus in the women’s doubles at Wimbledon because of a knee injury.
Serena, who has won 23 Grand Slam titles and is now 44, made a surprising comeback to tennis in June at the Queen’s tournament after being away for nearly four years. She played doubles with Canadian star Victoria Mboko, and they won their first match before Mboko had to pull out due to a knee problem.
Serena then played at the Berlin Open with Karolína Muchová, but they lost in the first round.
After lots of buzz, Serena finally returned to singles at Wimbledon, but she lost a tough match to Australia’s Maya Joint. Despite this, she was supposed to play doubles with Venus on July 5, against Solana Sierra and Camila Osorio.
However, on July 4, Serena shared that she had to withdraw from the doubles because her knee wasn’t ready. She posted a photo showing her knee wrapped up and syringes of fluid that had been drained.
She wrote, “I’m really sad to have to pull out of doubles. Coming back to play has been such a gift, and playing alongside @venuswilliams again meant so much to me. I did everything I could, but my knee just isn’t ready yet.
“I’m very thankful to tournament director Jamie Baker and the whole team for helping me try to recover. Thanks to all the fans for your amazing support—it’s made this comeback special. Stay tuned, I hope to be back soon!
“The syringes are the fluid drained after my singles match—yikes! The good news is it shouldn’t build up like that again. The bad news is I wasn’t ready for doubles this time.”