Serena Williams, 44, makes stunning tennis return with husband and kids cheering her on at Wimbledon – after using weight-loss jabs to kick-start her comeback

Serena Williams made an emotional return to Wimbledon on Tuesday, competing in the singles draw at a tournament for the first time in four years in front of her family.

The 44-year-old icon made a remarkable return to the sport to face World No 87 Team Maya on Center Court at Wimbledon.

The 23-time Grand Slam champion was calm and collected as he walked confidently into the heart of SW19.

The crowd on the iconic court broke into a raucous applause, wildly applauding the tennis legend. It wasn’t something Williams could hear, who wore a pair of pale pink headphones to drown out the noise and stay in the zone.

There was no chance of missing the cheers when he scored the first point of the match on his opponent’s serve minutes later.

At just 20 years old, Australian Joint is part of a new generation of female tennis players who have never faced Williams on the court.

Legend was supported by her husband Alexis Ohanian and their two daughters

Tuesday’s first-round match marks his first return to SW19 in four years and after publicly stepping away from the sport following the 2022 US Open.

Since stepping away from the sport, Williams has welcomed her second daughter, Adira, with Alexis Ohanian in the box to cheer her on.

The two-year-old defied Wimbledon’s age restrictions to sit next to her father and eight-year-old older sister Olympia on Center Court and watch her mother compete at SW19 for the first time.

Wimbledon traditionally has an age limit of five years and above for participation on the show courts. But exceptions were made for the seven-time winner’s daughter.

Williams’s sister Venus and her new brother-in-law, Italian actor Andrea Preti, whom Venus married last year, also joined Williams’ supporters.

The sisters will form a strong duo at the weekend when they team up in the doubles draw, which they have won six times.

The All England Club had left one of the women’s singles wildcard slots conspicuously unclaimed and on Sunday it was announced that Serena would test herself against the world’s best players, many of whom are less than half her age, at the event she has won seven times.

Four years after her last professional match, the 44-year-old began her return to tennis at the Queen’s Club’s HSBC Championships, where she won one round before being forced out due to an injury to partner Victoria Mboko.

Ohanian sat in Williams’ box with two (left) Adria and eight (right) Olympians.

Williams’ youngest cheers on legendary mom as Ohanian lifts her up in the players’ box

Tuesday’s first round clash marks his first return to SW19 in four years

His sister Venus and his new brother-in-law, Italian actor Andrea Preti, were also in attendance.

Williams had previously signaled a potential return to grass courts following her return to competitive tennis alongside Venus in the doubles draw.

While many will question whether the veteran still has a huge talent, others may be more focused on the question mark over one particular detail of his preparation: whether Williams continues to use GLP-1 vaccines administered by Ro, the telehealth company for which he became a paid spokesperson last year.

The seven-time Wimbledon champion’s wife, Alexis Ohanian, sits on the company’s board and was an early investor. In February, Williams, the company’s celebrity face, appeared in the brand’s Super Bowl commercial as well as its Zepbound tirzepatide vaccine, marketed under the name Mounjaro.

Williams, who is said to have lost approximately two and a half stone, or 15kg, by using the drug, has previously described her struggle to lose weight following the birth of her two children as ‘the only opponent she could not defeat’.

It remains unclear whether Williams continues to use the drug, which also treats symptoms of diabetes, and the journalist declined to comment when asked by the Atlantic.

But while GLP-1s have not been banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), there is ongoing research into whether they could be classified as performance enhancers in the future.

Tennis has an existing relationship with weight-loss injections, although Williams was the first athlete to publicly use GLP-1 if she were still using Zepbound; semaglutide Ozempic was a surprising sponsor at last year’s Canadian Open.

Speaking to WADA’s chief scientific officer, Professor Olivier Rabin, Daily Mail Sport understands that the organisation’s study into GLP-1s has been extended to 2026.

Proud Venus appears as she films her sister’s blockbuster entrance to Center Court

Williams has previously been open about using weight-loss medications in her role as Ro’s ambassador.

Williams returns to tennis and dominates Queen’s Club at the start of the month

“The WADA List Expert Advisory Group discussed their status alongside other substances in the same class,” the agency said in a statement shared with the Athletic in June.

‘Semaglutide and tirzepatide’ were added to the Monitoring Program in order to monitor in-competition and out-of-competition usage patterns in sports. The Monitoring Program includes substances that are not on the Prohibited List but which WADA wishes to monitor to identify potential patterns of abuse in sport.’

Williams had to return to the anti-doping testing pool before announcing her comeback.

But the tennis legend took aim at the rules when asked about returning to the pool on Sunday.

‘It’s so tiring. Now they changed the rules. I didn’t know some of the rules. So apparently even if you miss a test outside your window, it’s still considered a miss. “I guess I won’t be able to go pick up my kids,” said the seven-time Wimbledon champion mother of two.

‘This is unprofessional. I hate it. I think it’s necessary, but in most cases, if I want to go to places outside my window, I think I should be able to go without it counting as a missed exam.’

Players are required to report their daily ‘presence’ for unannounced testing by the International Tennis Integrity Agency.

Williams called it ‘unreasonable’.

‘That was a big reason why I didn’t want to go back,’ he said, ‘because it’s so hard. So my life is busy, I run a company, I run a venture capital firm, I travel the world. I have children. It’s like I could be in so many different cities, so many different times.’