Former World No. 1 players Venus Williams and Caroline Wozniacki headline the eight women who received wild-card entries into the main draw of the U.S. Open.

Play in the main draw begins Aug. 28 in New York.

Others receiving tournament entries are Americans Ashlyn Krueger, Robin Montgomery, Kayla Day and Clervie Ngounoue, as well as Australia’s Storm Hunter and France’s Fiona Ferro.

Williams won the U.S. Open in 2000 and 2001, two of her seven Grand Slam wins. Now 43, she will be making her 24th U.S. Open appearance.

Injuries kept Williams out the first six months of the year, but she competed at Wimbledon and also at the Western & Southern Open in Mason, Ohio.

Williams lost to eventual runner-up Elina Svitolina of Ukraine in the first round in London. At the WTA 1000 event near Cincinnati, she defeated Veronika Kudermetova in the first round on Monday for her first top-20 win since 2019.

Wozniacki, 33, returned to competition last week in Montreal for the first time since the 2020 Australian Open. She retired from tennis, gave birth to two children, and decided to return to the tour this summer.

The 2018 Australian Open champion, Wozniacki won her first match at the National Bank Open at Montreal but was defeated in the second round by Wimbledon champion Marketa Vondrousova of the Czech Republic.

She dropped her first-round match at the Western & Southern Open to lucky loser Varvara Gracheva, who represents France.

Wozniacki, from Denmark, is a two-time finalist at the U.S. Open, finishing as the runner-up in 2009 and 2014. She lost to Belgium’s Kim Clijsters in 2009 and to Serena Williams in the later match.

–Field Level Media