Wimbledon is desperate for some Serena Williams drama

Serena Williams is already making plans to sprinkle some of her stardust on Wimbledon this year – and an All England Club already deprived of big names for this year will be delighted to hear it.

Williams, 44, rejoined the anti-doping pool at the end of last year, a requirement for anyone wishing to play professional tennis. Having passed the six-month probationary period, she is now eyeing a return on the grass that could start in just over a week.

The i Paper understands that the 23-time grand slam champion is already in talks over a doubles wildcard at the Queen’s Club in London, where the WTA event gets underway on 8 June. She is expected to play with Canadian teenager Victoria Mboko.

The LTA, who organise Queen’s, declined to comment but there is no doubt they would welcome the star quality and massive boost to ticket sales that Williams’s presence would represent.

But returning to professional tennis at 44 is no mean feat and Williams has not been spotted on a grass court as yet, which may explain why it is understood she has so far only discussed doubles, not singles, at Queen’s.

“It’s good for me. I’ll be very entertained!” said Naomi Osaka, who won her maiden grand slam against Williams at the 2018 US Open.

“Overall the scope of it, I think it will bring people to watch tennis, which she always does bring an audience with her.

”I’m going to be tuned into the first match, for sure. A lot of people are. I feel like for me everyone knows Serena and Venus were my role models growing up, so it’s going to be cool to see her on the grounds again.”

Osaka is not alone in her excitement, the bean-counters will be happy too. Unlike Queen’s, Wimbledon does not have to worry about ticket sales, but in a summer where there is also a World Cup going on in the USA, it never hurts to have extra storylines to compete with a busy sporting landscape and deliver TV ratings for broadcasters that ensure they come back with an extra zero on those mammoth broadcast deals.

And Wimbledon is possibly lacking some of that sparkle this year. Two-time champion and new darling of the British public Carlos Alcaraz is already out of the tournament with a wrist injury that has kept him out since mid-April, while defending champion Jannik Sinner has just limped out of the French Open with heat exhaustion and says he will not play again until Wimbledon itself. And Emma Raducanu’s injury struggles have continued in 2026, only appearing twice on the clay and losing both matches.

The great British men’s hope Jack Draper has at least recruited Andy Murray as a coach for the grass-court season, a narrative that will excite home fans no end, but that relies on the 24-year-old being fit. He has played just once since the Miami Open in March and has missed virtually the whole clay-court swing due to a knee problem.

So it rather relies on a number of unpredictable elements, not least Serena’s often capricious plans.

And quite what Williams, now a mother of two, wants to achieve by coming back to the pro game remains to be seen. She has a storied record in doubles but singles remains the pinnacle of the game and it is hard to believe that she does not see herself giving it a go. Her last two singles matches at Wimbledon have ended in defeat to Harmony Tan and retirement after tearing a hamstring, a record she would surely like to correct.

But there are other questions too, such as whether she would also return to the US Open, who gave her a huge send-off in 2022. It would be strange if she just jumped back in for Wimbledon and didn’t return to her home major. Or is this all just actually about Venus, and her sister coming back for one last dance in the the famous Williams doubles team?

And what about the weight loss injections for which the American has become a poster girl? Some of the ingredients of which are on the World Anti-Doping Agency’s monitoring programme as possible performance-enhancing substances, meaning they are not currently banned but might one day become so. If Williams were to come back and even win a significant title – unlikely as that may be – and one of those was subsequently added to the banned list, there would be a move to put an asterisk next to that achievement.

But that is comfortably into the realms of the hypothetical – and all of which is to come. One thing is for sure: Serena’s comeback is going to get people talking about tennis again.