Emma Raducanu said she would love to speak to Serena Williams as the 23-time Grand Slam champion prepares to return to professional tennis next week for the first time since 2022, with the comeback set to come on British soil at Queen's in London. Raducanu, training on Andy Murray Arena alongside Amanda Anisimova, said Williams has too much experience and too many lessons not to be worth talking to.
The interest is not hard to understand. Williams, 44, is due to partner Victoria Mboko in the doubles and her return has put the grass-court season under an immediate spotlight, especially for players like Raducanu who are trying to build momentum on the surface. Raducanu has been working on serving and returning before the swing, the two parts of the game she said everything starts from.
Raducanu has recent reasons to think about that next step. She lost 6-0, 7-6 to Solana Sierra in the first round at Roland-Garros after taking a long break from competing before Strasbourg and the French Open, and she said the spell away taught her a few things heading into grass. The training courts at Queen's have also stirred a memory she has not forgotten: nearly four years ago in Cincinnati, she beat Williams 6-4, 6-0.
That match, Raducanu said, came with its own weight because it was announced Williams was stopping at the end of the US swing. She said she was super nervous before facing her, and the aftermath was difficult enough that she wanted back on court straight away to put it behind her. Even now, she said she has not spoken to Williams about the comeback, though she would love to, and she does not see herself still playing in her forties.
For now, the next conversation may be the simplest one: Raducanu said she will ask later. If it happens, it would link a player still trying to steady her own season with one of the sport's most decorated figures, just as Williams steps back into competition and the grass-court schedule begins to tighten around them both.
