Serena Williams in ‘painful’ Australian Open | Golf News

Tennis icon Serena Williams has admitted that it has been watching the early rounds of this yr’s Australian Open following her retirement from the game. The 43-year-old hung up her racket back in 2022 following a glittering profession which noticed her win a staggering 23 Grand Slam single titles.

Only Australian ace Margaret Court boasts more main wins than the American hero, who reigned as world No. 1 for a complete of 319 weeks during her enjoying days. Williams’ ultimate Grand Slam event victory got here on the Australian Open in 2017, with this her seventh triumph at Melbourne Park.

Since retirement, the youthful Williams sister has turned her skills to a quantity of initiatives, together with establishing the Los Angeles Golf Club (LAGC) staff – which competes in the TGL. Collin Morikawa, Sahith Theegala and Justin Rose kind half of the staff, with Williams having watched them in motion at SoFi Center, Florida this week.

However, it seems that the retired tennis legend was lacking the game the place she first made her title during an look on ESPN as she watched her staff in the golf simulator league. Speaking to Matt Barrie, she confessed: “Well the Australian Open is on. I’ve been watching every minute and loving every minute.

“It’s been so thrilling to watch. Slightly painful, really, prefer it hurts my soul. But it’s OK. I’m nonetheless loving it. Oh my god, a lot. I’m like obsessed. I’m obsessive about the game. I by no means realized how a lot till I’m right here watching golf.”

However, Williams gave the impression to be having fun with watching the TGL motion during the printed, saying; “It’s so thrilling to be right here as a staff proprietor and simply get a totally different take a look at issues. “It’s so wild. It’s something that you see a little bit in tennis, and we see it all the time in basketball, right? But we don’t really see it so much in golf. Actually we never see that in golf, right?

She added: “So it is simply so good to variety of see their personalities and simply see them shine as golfers as they’re, as a result of they’re often so centered, so severe and so prepared. So it is so cool to see a new side.”

Tuesday night’s TGL action saw the return of league co-founder Tiger Woods, who is coming off a lengthy injury lay-off, having not played since last year’s Open Championship.

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The all-time great conceded afterwards that he was struggling with his game, but encouraged fans by insisting his fitness was back up to speed.

After insisting his condition was good and that he was in a position to play without pain, he conceded: “It’s my recreation [that] is just not superb.”