Serena Williams has not played a competitive match since winning the 2017 Australian Open. (Paul Crock/AFP/Getty Images)
Any doubt that Serena Williams would be back in time for the start of the 2018 tennis season was all but erased on Sunday morning, when the 23-time Grand Slam champion essentially delivered an early Christmas present for her fans.
Williams will play on Dec. 30 in an exhibition match at the Mubadala World Tennis Championship in Abu Dhabi against world No. 7 and defending French Open champion Jelena Ostapenko, the tournament announced Sunday. Williams and Ostapenko will be the first women to play in the tournament, which started in 2009.
It will also be the 36-year-old Williams’s first competitive match since winning the Australian Open last January while roughly eight weeks pregnant. Williams gave birth to her daughter, Alexis Olympia Ohanian Jr., on Sept. 1.
For the first time in the history of #MWTC, we’re bringing you two of the world’s best female players! #MWTC10 will see 23-time Grand Slam champion @serenawilliams making her comeback against the 2017 #rolandgarros Champion Jelena Ostapenko, as they play each other on Day 3! pic.twitter.com/S3uWvxkpa5
— MWTC (@MubadalaTennis) December 24, 2017
“I am delighted to be returning to the court in Abu Dhabi for the first time since the birth of my daughter in September,” Williams said in a statement. “The Mubadala World Tennis Championship has long marked the beginning of the men’s global tennis season and I am excited and honoured to be making my comeback as part of the first women to participate in the event. I look forward to seeing the fans in Abu Dhabi at the 10th Edition of the Championship very soon.”
Williams, ranked No. 22 in the world, has teased fans of a comeback in recent days. On Dec. 11, Williams posted a photo on Instagram of her wearing gold and white Nike shoes and socks on a tennis court with the caption, “Be excited. Be very excited…”
In October, Australian Open tournament director Craig Tiley announced in a news conference that, “Serena will be back.” Williams’s name appears on the entry list for the tournament, which runs Jan. 15-28.
She even hinted at her comeback as early as June 2017 when she told Vanity Fair, “I don’t think my story is over yet.”
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Serena Williams introduces her baby daughter to the world: ‘Meet Alexis Olympia Ohanian Jr.’
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Serena Williams wrote a letter to her mother today. Here it is.