Back in September, Serena Williams gave birth to a daughter. Now, the American is targetting a comeback for the Australian Open. The 35-year-old discovered she was expecting shortly before the 2017 Australian Open in January. But she went on to win the tournament without dropping a set. According to tournament director Craig Tiley, she hopes to return to grand slam tennis in time for the 2018 Australian Open in January. Her target is rather ambitious because the Australian Open is just 4-5 months after her pregnancy.

Tiley on Serena Williams

After announcing what fans could expect of the 2018 tournament, he said that Serena wants to win more than 23 grand slam titles. She was eight weeks pregnant when she played the Australian Open and very few people knew that”. The 23-time grand slam singles champion and her fiance Alexis Ohanian named their daughter Alexis Olympia Ohanian Jr.

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Tiley said “We have a special relationship with Serena, the Williams family, both her and Venus. She wants to come back in 2018 and defend her title. Obviously, at training now, there is several months to go and it will be up to her as far as where she is with her fitness.”

Men’s Tennis

The tournament director also said that he hopes big names such as Andy Murray and Novak Djokovic also return to the court. Murray has struggled most of this year with a hip problem which saw him limp through his Wimbledon campaign and forced him to miss the US Open.

Tiley said that there has been a lot of concern and conjecture on the men’s side. Especially around Andy Murray, Novak Djokovic, Kei Nishikori. He said that Murray has been training and he is preparing for having a great year in 2018. How much would this year have hurt him, to watch over the entire year Roger and Rafa share four grand slam titles. He would not have liked that. He admits that everyone knows Murray is back and wants to improve his current ranking of number three in the world and get back to No 1.”