The amazing Venus Williams is to start her 33rd straight season on the WTA Tour with an appearance at the Auckland Classic, fuelling the tantalising possibility she could be back playing at the Australian Open as a 45-year-old.
Organisers of the year-opening event in New Zealand announced on Wednesday that the seven-time grand slam champ would feature at their championships for a seventh time between January 5 and 11.
The news has led to hopes that Williams could be targeting a possible return to the Australian Open, where she hasn't competed since 2021.
She's played 21 times previously at the season's first slam and reached the final twice -- in 2003 and 2017, when she lost to sister Serena -- but in recent years has rarely travelled outside the US to play.
Her last appearances abroad were in the 2023 season, during the grass-court swing, where she played at Birmingham before going on to Wimbledon.
She also began that year by playing in Auckland, where she also won the title in 2015, and would have played as a wildcard at Melbourne Park if she hadn't suffered an injury in New Zealand.
Now down at 570 on the WTA computer, Williams is a big attraction whenever and wherever she plays these days as an icon of the sport and would surely be gifted a wildcard for the Australian Open, which starts a week after the Auckland Classic, if she wanted.
In August, after a long spell out with injury, she played in the singles at the US Open and even took a set off 11th seed Karolina Muchova before going out in the first round.
Her best win came in Washington, where she beat world No.35 Peyton Stearns in straight sets, while her doubles appearance alongside Leylah Fernandez at Flushing Meadows was also a headline-grabber as the pair reached the quarter-finals at the US Open.
Williams last competed in the Australian Open in 2021 when she reached the second round and became the first forty-something to win a match in a grand slam main draw since Martina Navratilova 17 years earlier, but she struggled with injury in the second round before bowing out to Italian Sara Errani.
