Next month, Venus Williams will play a WTA Tour event for the first time since last summer's US Open. The seven-time Grand Slam singles champion has been awarded a wild card to the BNP Paribas Open along with another former world No. 1, Caroline Wozniacki.
All of the WTA's current Top 10 were included in the tournament's initial entry list last week, and the event announced both Williams and Wozniacki as wild-card additions on Tuesday. Williams is expected to play in Indian Wells for a ninth time, while Wozniacki, who returned to tennis last summer after a more than three-year retirement, was the 2011 champion at the WTA 1000 event. She also reached the final in 2013.
Williams suffered a knee injury in a first-round loss to Elina Svitolina at Wimbledon last July, and it affected the second half of her season in 2023—which she shut down after a 6-1, 6-1 loss to Belgian qualifier Greet Minnen in the first round at Flushing Meadows. The 43-year-old chronicled her last six months in a video on her YouTube channel in January, where she called the cartilage damage she's since been rehabilitating one of the "craziest" injuries she's tried to play through in her 30-year pro career.
Williams has not played in Indian Wells since 2019, but told fans in the video that returning to both was one of the "big goals" she had for her latest comeback—and that she's been encouraged every step of the way by her sister, Serena Williams.
"My little sister, Serena, told me I'm not allowed to quit, and of course, I would never quit," she said. "But it's the mandate. She said no, so I will be back on the court."
Wozniacki, meanwhile, went 1-2 to start 2023 in her first two events: She lost in the first round in Auckland to Svitolina, and in the second round of the Australian Open to qualifier Maria Timofeeva. In five tournaments in her comeback so far, the 2018 Australian Open champion, now 33 years old, is 5-5—with the highlight being a fourth-round effort in New York, where she lost to eventual champion Coco Gauff. She, too, last played in Indian Wells in 2019 before her initial retirement from the sport after the 2020 Australian Open.
Main-draw action at the 2024 BNP Paribas Open will be played from March 6-17.
