Serena Williams earns nomination for WTA Comeback Player of the Year 2022

Serena Williams made her WTA Tour comeback at Wimbledon this year after a 364-day hiatus and is a contender for the WTA Comeback Player of the Year title.

The 41-year-old played at Cincinnati's All England Club in Toronto, where she lost three of her first four matches. When Serena Williams competed in the 2022 US Open, which she declared would be her final tennis competition, the Arthur Ashe Stadium was jam-packed for each match.

She beat Danka Kovinic before winning a tough three-set battle against Anett Kontaveit. Williams initially looked like she might fight her way to the title, but in the end, after three hours and seven minutes, she was defeated by Ajla Tomljanovic in three sets.

Even though she is 41 and has been absent for about a year, she has shown an extraordinary spirit of perseverance.

It would be fascinating to see whether she is also not nominated for the WTA Comeback Player of the Year in 2023 after making several hints that she could return after retiring.

Williams has earned the title of Comeback Player of the Year twice, in 2004 and 2018. In addition to the 1998 Newcomer of the Year and the 1999 Most Improved Player trophies, she earned seven Player of the Year accolades throughout her career.

She was nominated along with Donna Vekic, Daria Saville, and Tatjana Maria this year.

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"I'll always have a relationship with tennis" – Serena Williams on her equation with Tennis

Serena Williams acknowledges that she missed Tennis

Serena Williams insisted that she was transitioning from tennis but never used the phrase "retiring." The American has already made a few allusions to perhaps playing again.

While she described Tom Brady's U-Turn retirement as an incredible trend, Williams offered her supporters some cause for optimism. At a later event in San Francisco, the 41-year-old claimed she was not retired. Williams led her supporters to believe through the two occurrences that the 23-time Grand Slam winner is genuinely thinking about making a comeback.

In her interview with Cosmopolitan, Williams was questioned about how she felt about tennis. Williams acknowledged that she missed the sport but sidestepped the subject without providing a definite answer:

"Yeah, I'll always have a relationship with tennis, right? So I'm gonna keep that open-ended, to be honest. It is. It's a big part of who I am. I love doing it. I love the competition. And you always love what you don't have. So I'm already missing it," Serena Williams said.