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Just one game into the family reunion of the decade, Venus Williams launched herself inside the baseline in her single-minded pursuit of a puffball second serve. For a brief moment, grandstand stadium at the Cincinnati Open had been transported back 15 years. Williams pounded her forehand return directly at the right hip of her opponent Marta Kostyuk, instantly eliciting gasps from the audience as she snatched the point. Back when the Williams sisters spent their spare time racking up grand slam titles for fun, this is how they dealt with most adversaries.
In the end, Venus and Serena’s first doubles match in four years, and just their second in the past decade, ended in a rollercoaster 6-2, 1-6, 10-8 defeat to Kostyuk and Peyton Stearns, another wildcard pair and two formidable singles players. For once, the result did not seem to matter.
“Winning is obviously great,” said Serena. “But I think in this position, [we’re] just having fun. I didn’t come out here to win this tournament. Obviously, I wanted to do the best I could do, but I think having fun and also just seeing how we are and how we feel out there. Being out there with the fans, too, is just really good, just to give them another opportunity to see us play, which is really cool.”
Even before she made the familiar trip to Mason, Ohio, Serena’s presence had been felt across the grounds this year. For two days during the first round, a plane circled above the tournament grounds carrying an advertisement banner of Serena endorsing Ro, a telehealth company that provides patients with access to GLP-1 weight loss drugs.
This match also quietly underlined how dysfunctional professional tennis can still be. Despite the massive anticipation surrounding the return of the Williams sisters – almost certainly the only time this audience will get to see them again – the rigid nature of television contracts meant the match was relegated to grandstand court, the tournament’s 5,000-seater second court. Every seat was full, with fans streaming out of the entrances and crowding the winding staircase from the adjoining stadium court, which holds 11,600 fans, to catch a glimpse of two American greats.
For all the goodwill, excitement and anticipation at the simple joy of seeing them together again, early on the spectacle itself was rough. After Venus held in the opening game, they conceded five consecutive games to trail 1-5. Serena’s lack of matchplay was the most obvious issue, with the younger Williams struggling to find her timing on her groundstrokes or rhythm on her usually immaculate serve.
As Serena’s rust gradually fell away, Venus was largely solid, pairing crisp shotmaking with some elite reflex volleys. By the start of set two, everything was flowing. They rolled through the second set and into a match tie-break. Down 2-8 in the tie-break, they nearly pulled off an outlandish comeback before a double fault from Venus at 8-9 ended their hopes.
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Serena has not competed since making her return to singles competition at Wimbledon last month, where she sustained a knee injury in her three set loss to Maya Joint, forcing her to withdraw from her planned doubles match with Venus there. “That was a little traumatic experience for me,” Serena said, smiling. “It took me two hours to leave the locker room that night and it’s been a long recovery, which is something I never thought I’d say because I never thought I’d be here sitting and talking to you all again. But, you know, what doesn’t kill you make you stronger.”
In her Instagram post after the loss, which included photos of vials she had used to collect the fluid from her knee, Serena said her followers would see her soon on a court near them, and here she made good on that vow. The US Open will follow for both sisters, but it is unclear whether they will take to the court in singles or doubles, and what will happen next. “I’ve never really enjoyed the process, but I think this time I’m enjoying the process a little bit more than I ever have,” said Serena. “It’s kind of just having a different view of it. And it’s also like this isn’t for ever. This is like not long. So it’s also just fun to know that too. And like I’m not playing every week. I’m not showing up every week and have kids. So it’s a little bit different.
If anything at all, Serena’s comeback, which has mostly been confined to the doubles court so far, has at least served as a reminder of the greatness of the Williams sisters’ doubles careers, achievements that are usually hidden behind their all-time great singles results. This is also one of the greatest doubles teams in history. They have won 14 grand slam titles together – winning every one of their grand slam finals – which places them joint-second in the open era among women’s doubles teams, behind only Martina Navratilova and Pam Shriver. They also reached world No 1 and captured three Olympic women’s doubles gold medals. Their partnership has now spanned four decades, yet still it endures. “I think we waited a long time to get back on the doubles court, even this year,” said Venus. “I think eventually we would find our way to each other.”
