Indian Wells is one of the most prestigious tournaments on the tennis calendar outside the four Grand Slams, but an event that the Williams sisters boycotted for a number of years.
It is often called the ‘fifth Grand Slam’ due to the large crowd it attracts and hosts the second largest tennis stadium in the world, behind Flushing Meadows’ Arthur Ashe Stadium in New York.
It has not been a happy tournament for everyone as Venus and Serena Williams boycotted the event following a truly shocking incident in 2001.
Serena won the title that year as a 19-year-old, beating Kim Clijsters in the final but she was booed throughout the match and racially abused, along with her sister Venus and father Richard.
The Williams sisters were due to play each other in the semi-final but Venus withdrew from the match 20 minutes beforehand, citing a knee injury, and this angered the crowd.
This only fuelled suggestions that Richard decided in advance which sister would win their matches against each other.
The vitriolic abuse directed to the Williams family was horrendous and they vowed never to return to Indian Wells.
Writing in her 2009 autobiography, On the Line, Serena said: “What got me most of all was that it wasn’t just a scattered bunch of boos. It wasn’t coming from just one section.
“It was like the whole crowd got together and decided to boo all at once. The ugliness was just raining down on me, hard.
“I didn’t know what to do. Nothing like this had ever happened to me. What was most surprising about this uproar was the fact that tennis fans are typically a well-mannered bunch.
“They’re respectful. They sit still. And in Palm Springs, especially, they tended to be pretty well-heeled, too.
“But I looked up and all I could see was a sea of rich people – mostly older, mostly white – standing and booing lustily, like some kind of genteel lynch mob.
“I don’t mean to use such inflammatory language to describe the scene, but that’s really how it seemed from where I was down on the court. Like these people were gonna come looking for me after the match.
“There was no mistaking that all of this was meant for me. I heard the word n***** a couple times, and I knew. I couldn’t believe it.
“That’s just not something you hear in polite society on that stadium court.
“Just before the start of play, my dad and Venus started walking down the aisle to the players’ box by the side of the court, and everybody turned and started to point and boo at them.
“It was mostly just a chorus of boos, but I could still hear shouts of ‘N*****!’ here and there.
“I even heard one angry voice telling us to go back to Compton. It was unbelievable.
“We refused to return to Indian Wells. Even now, all these years later, we continue to boycott the event.”
Serena decided to end her boycott in 2015 after 14 years of not attending the tournament in California.
“I feel that was 14 years ago and this is now,” she said after deciding to return. “I did the best that I could at this event, and I really am happy to have put a lot of that behind me.
“If I would have known I had to pull out, I would have played anyway just to have an opportunity to be back at this tournament and to be able to play.”
Venus returned to Indian Wells the following year after refusing to attend for 15 years.
It was announced that she received a wildcard entry for this year’s tournament at the age of 44.
However, Venus swiftly confirmed that she wouldn’t be playing and told the Tennis Weekly podcast: “I love Indian Wells.
“I would love to be there and if I could have accepted it, I would have been like, ‘Yes’. But I already made commitments.”
Indian Wells themselves also said: “Our team has been informed that Venus is not accepting the wild card this year.
“We wish Venus all the best and hope to see her back in Indian Wells in the future.”
