Serena and Venus Williams Shine in Emotional US Open Return
Under the Arthur Ashe lights, with the night session usually reserved for solo stars, two women in their mid-40s walked out as if time still belonged to them.
It didn’t. Not quite. But for long stretches, it felt like it did.
Serena and Venus Williams, back together at the US Open for the first time since 2022, turned a first‑round doubles match into appointment viewing again on Friday. Carlos Alcaraz, fresh off a straight-sets win, made it clear where he’d be.
“I think there is no better plan (than) to watch the doubles, the Williamses once again, while getting a treatment,” the defending men’s champion said. “I’m going to be ready for that.”
He wasn’t alone. Arthur Ashe Stadium, rarely handed to opening‑round doubles, crackled as if it were a second-week blockbuster. The sisters responded with a three‑set drama that veered from vintage defiance to raw vulnerability, before ending in a 6-3, 6-7 (6), 7-6 (10-7) defeat to Hao-Ching Chan and Maya Joint.
A 10-point match tiebreaker. A 5-0 lead. And then, heartbreak.
A comeback that stirred old memories
For a while, the story looked familiar. Down 4-1 in the deciding set, Serena and Venus did what they’ve done for more than two decades on this court: they pushed back. Returns grew sharper, the crowd louder, the energy unmistakable. They clawed their way to 4-4, then kept swinging, dragging the match into the super tiebreak.
At 44 and 46, after all the miles and all the trophies, they still knew how to seize a moment.
The early points of the breaker belonged entirely to them. They surged to 5-0, the stadium sensing another chapter in a partnership that has already produced 14 Grand Slam doubles titles and Olympic gold medals in 2000, 2008 and 2012. The scoreboard, the noise, the body language – everything screamed one more great escape.
Then the tension closed in.
Double faults crept into their games, both sisters faltering on serve at the worst possible time. The rhythm that had carried them from 4-1 down in the set to the brink of victory evaporated. Chan and Joint, who had hung on through the storm, suddenly had room to swing. Point by point, they reeled the Williamses back in, then passed them.
From 5-0 up to 10-7 down. A night that had seemed destined for a storybook finish instead ended with a stunned hush and a quick handshake.
The US Tennis Association said the sisters would not be available for comment.
A delayed return, a familiar opponent
This was Serena’s first US Open match since 2022 and her first at a Grand Slam since returning to tennis this summer. The comeback has not been gentle. Joint, the 22‑year‑old Australian across the net on Friday, has now beaten her twice in a matter of months.
Serena lost to Joint in three sets at Wimbledon in her return to singles, then hurt her knee there, forcing the sisters to withdraw from their doubles match. That injury pushed their Grand Slam reunion back to New York, the site of their doubles titles in 1999 and 2009 and the arena where they entered the night with a 27-7 record in 10 appearances together.
Now it reads 27-8.
Venus, who has kept grinding on tour at 46, had already exited in the first round of singles. This doubles run, slim as the odds might have been, carried the hope of one more deep week together. Instead, like their 2022 campaign, it ended in the opening round, again in a match tiebreak, echoing another recent loss in a breaker at the Cincinnati Open.
For a partnership that once shared the No. 1 ranking in women’s doubles and spent eight weeks there, the margins have grown cruelly thin.
Alcaraz cruises, Sabalenka finally feels the strain
While the Williams sisters wrestled with the weight of history, the current standard-bearers went about their work.
Alcaraz, back at the US Open after missing four months with a right wrist injury, eased into the round of 16 with a 6-3, 6-4, 6-1 win over Wu Yibing. The two-time champion looked sharp, aggressive, and increasingly at ease with every set.
“To be honest I’m better than I thought,” he said, a quiet warning to the rest of the draw.
Next comes No. 20 seed Tommy Paul, who edged No. 15 Alexander Bublik in five sets. A tougher test, a familiar stage, and a chance for Alcaraz to push closer to a third title in New York.
Aryna Sabalenka, chasing a slice of Serena’s legacy as she aims to become the first player since Williams (2012–14) to win three straight US Open crowns, finally had to dig in. After two routine wins, the No. 1 seed found resistance in Kamilla Rakhimova — and a different kind of distraction.
Sabalenka won 6-3, 6-4, but the second set lasted 54 minutes, a minute longer than her entire previous match. The tennis tightened, the rallies lengthened, and she had to ride out both her opponent’s surge and the smell of marijuana drifting through the court.
She held firm, though, and will face Taylor Townsend in the round of 16, the stakes climbing with every match.
A night that felt like a farewell – even if no one said it
No one announced a goodbye on Friday. There were no speeches, no tributes, no official curtain call for the most decorated sister act the sport has ever seen.
But a first-round doubles match on Ashe, at night, for two legends in their mid-40s who have already walked away once? The symbolism hung in the air.
Serena and Venus Williams left with another painful defeat, another match that slipped from their hands. They also left, once again, as the main attraction.
If this really is the last time they share the big stage in New York, the sport’s new champions are already lining up to watch.
