Venus Williams has found her partner for Guangzhou: Janice Tjen, who knows the way to the title at this tournament, won last year with Katarzyna Piter. The Chinese WTA 250 has invited the American in singles and in doubles, on outdoor hard courts.
She is back in Asia for the first time since Tianjin in 2019. In singles, the run goes back to her win over Peyton Stearns in Washington in July 2025, on her return after sixteen months away: fifteen straight defeats, the latest in the first round of the US Open against Sofia Kenin, 6-2, 7-6(6).
Céline, a C30.4 (a club-level ranking) in Belgium’s weekend team league, known as interclubs, kept only one detail, the one that concerns her.
“What she’s doing there, it’s a pattern I know by heart. You go and get the girl who won last year, you stand next to her, and you play your game. Me, in ladies’ doubles, I asked the captain for the same thing in September. Take the best player in the club, the one who comes to the net without warning. He put me back with Martine, like every year. Martine is very good, mind you. She arrives at ten sharp, she always has a spare towel. But in terms of intentions, we don’t have the same project. And the 7-6(6) at the US Open, a tie-break two points away, I know that score too, it’s my stringing that signed it three times this season. The level in club league has gone way up, people don’t realise. I’ll talk to the captain again. Martine, for her part, has already booked the bubble for November.”
The tournament starts on 26 October. Céline has already asked for the doubles results to be sent to her, “to study the positioning”.
It’s true, we checked: Tennis Actu.
