This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

Serena Williams has announced she is engaged to the co-founder of Reddit, Alexis Ohanian.

Williams, who won the women’s singles title at Wimbledon in July, announced the engagement in a poem on a Reddit thread for people to share their engagement stories.

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She said in the poem, posted from her verified Reddit account, that Ohanian proposed at the place they first met during a surprise trip to Rome.

Williams wrote: “I came home/A little late/Someone had a bag packed for me/And a carriage waited. Destination: Rome/To escort me to my very own ‘charming/Back to where our stars first collided/And now it was full circle/At the same table we first met by chance/But by choice/ Down on knee/He said 4 words/And I said yes.”

The couple have been dating since at least late 2015, but have kept their relationship quiet, with the exception of a few Instagram posts.

Four weeks ago, Williams posted a photo of the couple at a costume party. Within minutes of the engagement announcement, comments on the photo were dominated with congratulatory messages and emojis.

Bear necessities A photo posted by Serena Williams (@serenawilliams) on Nov 28, 2016 at 6:14pm PST





Ohanian shared Williams’s Reddit post on his Facebook page with the message: “she said yes”. He also commented on her Reddit thread, writing: “And you made me the happiest man on the planet”.

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Williams is widely regarded one of the greatest tennis players of all time and has won 22 major singles titles and a further 16 in doubles. She will aim to win her seventh Australian Open title in Melbourne next month.

Both she and her sister Venus arrived in Auckland on Friday for a tournament leading up to the Open.

Venus Williams said she had to keep a lid on the news of her sister’s engagement after getting the early word.

“I might just be her big sister, I might know these things,” she said.