Serena plays down comeback: "Nothing long-term, just fun"

Serena Williams played down her on-court comeback Thursday at the Forbes Power Women's Summit in New York:

"Nothing long-term. It's mostly just having a lot of fun".

The 44-year-old American spoke on stage at Jazz at Lincoln Center with Moira Forbes, the publishing group's executive vice president, at the event's fourteenth edition.

The comeback began in June, after almost four years without an official match, with a wild card in doubles at the HSBC Championships in London. Then came Wimbledon in singles, again as a wild card, with a first-round loss to Australian Maya Joint 6-3, 6-7(6), 6-3. On August 25 came the US Open mixed doubles with Carlos Alcaraz, on September 4 the doubles with Venus Williams: eliminated in the opening round on Arthur Ashe by Joint and Hao-Ching Chan, after leading 5-0 in the decisive tiebreak and then losing ten of the next twelve points.

Williams said the drive comes from her two daughters, aged 9 and 3, to whom she wants to show "the person who's in their school books". On the same theme, she also spoke about her own role:

"As women we're expected to wear different hats without complaining, and I want to take that message and that moment. I have two little girls, and I want to show them too that they can do it".

When she stepped away after the 2022 US Open, she avoided the word retirement, preferring to talk about "evolution". At the Summit she described her life today as mostly business and investments: Serena Ventures funds women founders and entrepreneurs from underrepresented categories.

At Wimbledon the same dynamic played out that Williams later described in New York. The serve topping 190 km/h and the depth from the baseline are still there, the lateral movement isn't: Joint won the heavy points by sending the ball where the American could no longer reach. Against that backdrop, the on-and-off comeback formula fits what she said at the Summit.