Victoria Mboko withdrew from the Queen’s Club doubles matchup with Serena Williams after a left knee injury, ending a promising start to their partnership at the HSBC Championships in London.
Serena Williams and Victoria Mboko had barely built any time together on court when Mboko’s knee gave way.
Mboko will not play doubles with Williams this week after officially withdrawing from a planned second-round matchup Thursday, June 11 at the HSBC Championships at the Queen’s Club in London. The change comes after a knee injury forced Mboko to stop early during her singles match on Wednesday.
The sequence began when Mboko was moving across the court to reach a forehand against Karolina Pliskova. She slipped and fell to the grass, immediately clutching her left knee. Mboko did not play another point. and the match ended with Pliskova taking the first set 6-2 and Mboko trailing 4-3 in the second set.
After the match, Pliskova said Mboko had been improving as it went along and that it would have been “a nice match.” Pliskova added: “Of course, this is not the way we want to win, so hopefully she’s going to be fine for Wimbledon.”
That injury also froze what had been shaping up as a real step forward for Mboko’s doubles momentum with Williams. Their partnership had started strongly on June 9. when they defeated Nicole Melichar-Martinez and Erin Routliffe in straight sets—7-6. 6-2—during the first round of the HSBC Championships women’s doubles.
Before the pair played that June 9 match. Williams described Mboko’s early form in a way that hinted at a growing rhythm between the two. Williams said of Mboko: “What I liked most about her was that the next time she played. she still kept winning. So, it’s like, OK, I love that. You know, it reminded me a lot of myself.”.
The timing is stark: the partnership that looked like it was settling into a groove after a successful opening round will now be tested by absence—because Mboko’s left knee injury has pushed her out of the planned second-round doubles match against Williams.
For now, the focus shifts from the match to recovery. Mboko’s withdrawal from Thursday’s matchup at Queen’s Club leaves the doubles draw without the team that had beaten Melichar-Martinez and Routliffe just days earlier—and it adds urgency to the question Pliskova left hanging after the retirement: whether Mboko will be ready for Wimbledon.
Victoria Mboko Serena Williams Queen's Club HSBC Championships Wimbledon doubles knee injury Karolina Pliskova Nicole Melichar-Martinez Erin Routliffe