Venus Williams will contest her 25th US Open next week after organisers awarded the 45-year-old a wild card, extending her own record for appearances at Flushing Meadows. The seven-time major champion is scheduled to open on Arthur Ashe Stadium on Monday against Czech 11th seed Karolina Muchova, marking Williams’s first Grand Slam singles match since the 2023 tournament. Now ranked 610th, the American returned to the tour in July following a 16-month layoff that included surgery for uterine fibroids. She won a first-round match in Washington before early exits in subsequent events but said the New York stage "gets more exciting" each year and that tennis "is in my DNA." Williams’s start will be her 94th Grand Slam main-draw appearance, the most by any woman in the Open Era. Nearly three decades after her 1997 run to the US Open final, she enters with a career résumé that includes two singles titles in New York, five at Wimbledon and 14 doubles crowns alongside sister Serena. Her return also coincides with tributes marking 75 years since Althea Gibson broke the tournament’s colour barrier in 1950, a milestone Williams said merits wider recognition.