Many athletes often complain about the unnecessary exposure to the limelight which often takes away the simplicity from their lives at times. But, what would happen if a famous sportsperson is not recognized by the people? Well, former WTA legend Serena Williams had a one-of-a-kind moment yesterday in a Paris luxury restaurant, when the staff denied her entry. While the former tennis legend addressed the issue on social media, one of the restaurant employees’ revelation fueled the disappointment with a bizarre take on the matter.

Williams, who graced the Paris Olympic Opening Ceremony as one of the torch-bearers had an unexpected experience at a luxury hotel in Paris where she was “denied access” to the hotel’s rooftop restaurant.

The former Olympic gold-medalist shared this incident with her followers and wrote, “Yikes @peninsulaparis I’ve been denied access to rooftop to eat in a empty restaurant of nicer places … but never with my kids.” Williams further added a hashtag for Olympics 2024 with another message “Always a first”  to showcase that this is the first time she is dealing with such experiences.

While Williams’ post came as a surprise, staff from the hotel revealed some insider details of what happened that day to Variety Magazine. Maxime Mannevy, a Peninsula rooftop employee mentioned that Williams arrived with another woman and a stroller and she was completely “unrecognizable” by the restaurant employees.

Mannevy said, “when she came there were only two tables available and they had been reserved by clients of the hotel, My colleague didn’t recognize her and feels terrible, but he told her what he would have told any other client, which is to wait downstairs in the bar for a table to become available. That was absolutely nothing personal.” 

However, Mannevy wasn’t present when Williams visited the restaurant. As per the report, the restaurant’s employees didn’t discriminate against the former WTA legend but treated her like any other guest. While the Peninsula rooftop restaurant’s staff tried to handle the matter with care, Williams wasn’t very pleased when she was denied entry.

What made her even angrier was that she was denied entry with her two kids, Olympia and Adira, which never happened with her before. Taking note of Williams’ anger, the restaurant has also apologized to the former tennis star.

Paris rooftop restaurant apologised to Serena Williams

The Peninsula rooftop restaurant issued an apology to Williams and dropped a statement. “In response to Mrs. Williams’ tweet, for whom we have the utmost admiration and respect, as we do for all our esteemed guests, we can only reiterate our deepest apologies for her perception of tonight’s situation, Today, August 5th, our rooftop bar was indeed fully booked, and the only unoccupied tables at that time belonged to our gourmet restaurant, L’Oiseau Blanc, which was also fully reserved tonight.”

From the statement, the restaurant seems to take full credit for their mistake. However, at the same time, they mentioned treating Williams the same way as any other guest, which also seemed nonpartial from their side. The resultant further wrote, “She has always been, and will always be, more than welcome with her family at The Peninsula.”

Serena Williams’ recent encounter at the luxury restaurant was rather unfortunate. However, now that the restaurant has issued an apology, Williams may drop the disappointment and move on. Do you think her reaction was justified in the matter?