Serena Williams has been confirmed as eligible for an extraordinary return to professional tennis, just hours after she was criticised for her involvement in an advert during the Super Bowl. 

The Internaional Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) has included Williams on their list of reinstatements. That confirms that she has completed her six months of reentry into the anti-doping testing pool.

It has been confirmed that the re-entry will be completed in 13 days, on February 22. That means that Williams will be able to return to playing from them if she should chose to.

It comes after reports that the 44-year-old had applied for reinstatement back in August, after exploring the possibility of playing in last year’s US Open. That was not possible, due to her removal from the list three years earlier.

Should William choose to return to tennis, the deadline means that she could be eligible to make her comeback in the ATP-WTA 1000 Indian Wells, which starts in March. She could also be eligible for this year’s remaining Grand Slams, including the French Open and Wimbledon.

The commercial showed the tennis superstar injecting the GLP-1 and ordering a new pill version via the mobile app. But she was criticised by fans on social media.

Speaking about using the drug to lose weight following the birth of her second daughter, Williams revealed to People magazine: “I never was able to get to the weight I needed to be no matter what I did, no matter how much I trained.

“It was crazy because I’d never been in a place like that in my life where I worked so hard, ate so healthy and could never get down to where I needed to be at.

“I had never taken shortcuts in my career and always worked really hard,” she added. “I know what it takes to be the best. So it was very frustrating to do all the same things and never be able to change that number on the scale or the way my body looked.”