Serena Williams moving one step closer to potential tennis comeback

Serena Williams was listed Monday on the International Tennis Integrity Agency website as eligible to return to competition on Feb. 22, after six months in the tennis testing pool, according to ESPN.

It comes after the 23-time Grand Slam singles champion reentered the anti-doping test pool through the ITIA last year, which led some to believe that she could be launching a comeback to the sport.

Williams, 44, denied that at the time.

“Omg yall I’m NOT coming back. This wildfire is crazy,” she tweeted in December.

U.S. Tennis Association spokesman Brendan McIntyre said at the time, “If Serena decides to return and compete at the professional level, together with her fans, we will enthusiastically welcome the return of one of the greatest champions in the history of our sport.”

During an interview with “Today” show host Savannah Guthrie last month, Williams was caught off guard when asked about a potential return to tennis.

“I mean really, are you asking this on the ‘Today’ show? Oh my God,” Williams said.

“They would kill me if I didn’t,” Guthrie replied.

Williams, who played coy, explained, “I’m just having fun and enjoying my life right now,” adding, “I don’t know, I’m just going to see what happens.”

The tennis icon tried to put the subject to bed, saying she wasn’t able to discuss it.

“Did I re-enter?” Williams said of the drug testing protocol. “I didn’t know if I was out. Listen, I can’t discuss this.”

Williams has not competed since the 2022 US Open.

In a candid essay for Vogue magazine, published in early August 2022, Williams said she was “evolving away from tennis,” following the year’s final major — and that she and her husband, Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian, wanted to have another child.

They have two daughters, Olympia, 8, and Adira, born in August 2023.

Williams made waves when she revealed she is a paid spokesperson for the company Ro last August.

The WYN Beauty founder said she turned to the GLP-1 — short for glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists — after she struggled to stay at a “healthy” weight following the births of her daughters, Olympia in 2017 and Adira in 2023.

Ro’s website states Williams “lost 34 pounds in a year with GLP-1s.”