Venus Williams made a winning return to tennis after a 16-month hiatus as she won her first round in the women’s doubles at the Citi Open.
Williams, the seven-time Grand Slam champion, accepted a wildcard for the event in Washington, DC and had not played since the Miami Open in March last year.
Now 45, Williams joined compatriot Hailey Baptiste in the doubles, where the pair defeated Eugenie Bouchard and Clervie Ngounoue 6-3 6-1 to progress into the second round.
Williams won the Cincinnati Open back in August 2023 - her last title - and she is not limiting herself to doubles, with her first-round singles match against fellow American Peyton Stearns.
Venus and her sister Serena boast a combined 30 major singles titles, and they won 14 Grand Slam doubles events together as well.
It was Venus’ first time playing doubles in three years, and she joined 23-year-old Baptiste, the world No50, in the capital.
She joked afterwards that she preferred playing with Baptiste than with her younger sister, who she dominated the tennis world with.
"I think from the first point I could see that we were going to be a good team,” Williams told Sky Sports after her first-round win.
“We just should have started playing earlier, years ago, right? I think Serena was just in the way.
"It was inspiring to be out here, I love this game and still hitting it big."
Williams does not have a ranking due to such a long period out of the game, and it remains to be seen whether she will continue to play the American hard-court swing ahead of the US Open, which begins at the end of August.
Elsewhere in the women’s doubles draw, British No1 Emma Raducanu partnered with former Wimbledon champion Elena Rybakina to defeat her compatriot Olivia Nicholls and her partner Tereza Mihalikova 2-6 7-6(4) 11-9. Nicholls and Mihailikova were the fourth seeds in the draw.
Raducanu and Rybakina’s partnership took its time to gel, as the pair lost the opening five games of the opening set, being broken three times, before recovering to take the match with two tiebreak victories.
