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    The Notable Comebacks at the Australian Open

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    After extended layoffs, Naomi Osaka, Angelique Kerber and others are back on the court.A comeback provides no guarantee of success, but few sports provide more comebacks than professional tennis.They are arriving wave after wave, particularly in the women’s game, where returning to action after maternity has become more common.After the WTA stars Elina Svitolina and Caroline Wozniacki came back last season, the trend is continuing in 2024, with Naomi Osaka and Angelique Kerber, both former No. 1 players and multiple major champions.Both are new mothers who have been out of the game for more than a year and both will be in the draw as the 2024 season begins in earnest on Sunday with the Australian Open, the year’s first Grand Slam tournament, which Kerber won in 2016 and Osaka in 2019 and 2021.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?  More

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      Novak Djokovic Comes Full Circle at the Australian Open

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      Deported a year ago and unable to play in 2022’s first Grand Slam tournament, Djokovic deeply felt this major title, his 22nd, calling it “a huge relief.”MELBOURNE, Australia — It felt like a full-circle occasion as Novak Djokovic celebrated on Sunday in the same city where he had been deported on a Sunday little more than a year ago.It felt like a cycle was ending. With the Australian Open title and the No. 1 ranking back in his possession, he cried in a way that he had never cried before at Melbourne Park or perhaps at any tournament: with big, loud, body-wrenching sobs as he lay on his back in the players’ box after embracing his family and team and then dropping to the ground, overcome by it all.When he finally returned to his feet and then to his courtside seat, he buried his face in a white towel and sobbed some more.“I just felt this huge burden off my back with everything we’ve been through,” he said. “It was a huge relief, and a huge release as well.”Djokovic has experienced no shortage of powerful sensations in Rod Laver Arena: the coming-of-age giddiness of winning his first Grand Slam singles title in 2008; the sweet misery of winning the longest major singles final in history in 2012 over Rafael Nadal, a 5-hour-53-minute test that left both combatants too weary to stand for the awards ceremony.But Sunday will surely occupy a category apart. Not for the final itself — a relatively straightforward 6-3, 7-6 (4), 7-6 (5) victory over Stefanos Tsitsipas — but for all that led to it and how Djokovic reacted.“He’s keeping everything inside,” Goran Ivanisevic, his coach, said. “Sometimes you have to explode.”Djokovic’s decision not to be vaccinated for the coronavirus has had big consequences, and returning to Australia after his forced exit on the eve of last year’s Australian Open would have been plenty to process on its own. But then came the left hamstring injury that caused Djokovic to hobble at times during the early rounds.Ivanisevic said “97 percent” of players would have withdrawn from the tournament if they had received magnetic resonance imaging test results that looked like Djokovic’s.“But not him; he is from outer space,” said Ivanisevic, pointing a finger to his temple. “His brain is working different.”The 2023 Australian OpenThe year’s first Grand Slam event runs from Jan. 16 to Jan. 29 in Melbourne.Coaching That Feels Like ‘Cheating’: In-match coaching has always happened on the sly, but this year is the first time the Australian Open has allowed players to be coached from the stands.Rod Laver Likes What He Sees: At 84 years old, the man with his name on the stadium sits courtside at the Australian Open.India’s Superstar: Sania Mirza, who leaves tennis as a sleeping giant, has been a trailblazer nonetheless. “I would like to have a quieter life,” she said.Behind the Scenes: A coterie of billionaires, deep-pocketed companies and star players has engaged for months in a high-stakes battle to lead what they view as a once-in-a-generation opportunity to disrupt the sport.Djokovic, who said he would have withdrawn if this were not a Grand Slam tournament, said he did not practice on any of the off days. He followed the same template in 2021 when he won the title after tearing an abdominal muscle. This time, he also required extensive therapy.“Look, a lot of people doubted and still doubt that I was injured,” he said, explaining that he would provide evidence at some stage. “But again, I don’t feel I need to prove anything to anyone. But it did affect me, especially in the first week. From the fourth round onwards, I felt like it was behind me.”Then came the latest controversy sparked by his father, Srdjan, who posed for photos with flag-carrying Russian supporters inside Melbourne Park after Djokovic’s quarterfinal defeat of the Russian Andrey Rublev on Wednesday.Djokovic explained that his father had intended to celebrate with Serbian fans as he had been doing throughout the tournament. But it was Djokovic who was left to address the incident with tournament officials and to explain it directly to the news media.“It required an enormous mental energy really to stay present, to stay focused, to take things day by day and really see how far I can go,” Djokovic said.Stefanos Tsitsipas, left, and Djokovic, during the trophy ceremony.Loren Elliott/ReutersBut it hardly affected the bottom line. He did not lose a set in the semifinal against Tommy Paul, an unseeded American, or in the final against Tsitsipas, the shaggy-haired, 24-year-old Greek star who beat Djokovic in two of their first three matches but has now lost to him 10 times in a row.On Sunday, Tsitsipas’s best shot, the forehand, too often cracked under Djokovic’s pressure, and sometimes it seemed as if it cracked simply at the prospect of Djokovic’s pressure. But Tsitsipas, who would have become No. 1 for the first time with a first major title, did not look quite as crestfallen as he did after losing a two-set lead to Djokovic in the 2021 French Open final.“Paris was heartbreaking,” he said.Instead, whether he realized it or not, he tried to take a page on Sunday night from Djokovic’s early-career playbook: when the Serb was getting beaten repeatedly by more established champions like Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal. Despite the frustration and dejection, Djokovic came to see playing his accomplished rivals as an opportunity to get the most out of himself.“Novak is a player that pushes you to your limits,” Tsitsipas said. “I don’t see this as a curse. I don’t see this as something, like, annoying. This is very good for the sport, to have competitors like him, to have champions like him. He’s very important for us that want to get to his point one day.”This seems the smart approach rather than stewing in negativity. But the reality for Tsitsipas is that Djokovic won that first Grand Slam title in 2008 in Melbourne at age 20 and won four more majors before he turned 25. And however full circle it all felt in Melbourne on Sunday night, Djokovic is hardly done searching for more titles, more ways to win.He and Nadal, who won the Australian Open in Djokovic’s absence last year, are back in a tie with 22 Grand Slam singles titles apiece. Djokovic wants the lead and as many majors as he can get before time and younger men inevitably deprive him of the opportunity.Like Federer, whose wife Mirka’s support on the home front and on the road with their young children allowed him to compete successfully on tour into his late 30s, Djokovic’s wife, Jelena, is giving him the same flexibility with their young son and daughter. Unvaccinated for the coronavirus, he is still unable to enter the United States at this stage but said he hoped a change in policy would allow him to enter in time to play at Indian Wells, Calif., in March.“I still have lots of motivation; let’s see how far it takes me,” he said. “I don’t know how many more years I’m going to play or how many more Slams I’m going to play. It depends on various things. It doesn’t depend only on my body.“I think it’s extremely important for me to first have the support and love from the close ones and the ability to go and play and keep the balance with the private life. But at the same time have the mental clarity or — how should I say — aspirations to really strive to chase these trophies. Physically I can keep myself fit. Of course, 35 is not 25, even though I want to believe it is. But I still feel there is time ahead of me.”Djokovic’s let out a scream, and also sobbed, after winning the men’s singles final on Sunday.Lintao Zhang/Getty ImagesFederer, 41, retired last September, and Nadal, 36, no doubt remains a threat when healthy but is out of action again for at least several weeks, this time with the hip injury that contributed to his losing in the second round to Mackenzie McDonald.Ivanisevic expects Nadal back in force in the spring for the clay-court season that culminates with the French Open, which Nadal has won a mind-bending 14 times, more than any player has won any Grand Slam tournament.“What I feel Nadal and I do, what we still fight for and what still motivates us the most is winning the biggest titles in our sport and keeping up with the young guns,” Djokovic said. “I think tennis is in good hands with great characters, great personalities and great players, but we’re still not going anywhere.”Djokovic has now joined Nadal in the double-digit club at a major tournament with his 10th Australian Open title.It has been and remains quite a duel, elevating and at times exhausting both men. Chasing excellence is hard enough; chasing it through adversity, whatever its provenance, is harder still.Though Djokovic, with his supreme timing and elastic movement, can make a difficult game look easy, his emotions in the aftermath on Sunday made it clear how challenging this tournament and this cycle have been. A little more than a year ago, he and Ivanisevic were at Melbourne Airport, being escorted to their plane out of the country.Now, Djokovic is back on top Down Under.“I would say this is probably the biggest victory of my life, considering the circumstances,” he said, the Australian Open trophy back in very familiar hands. More

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      Aryna Sabalenka Wins the Australian Open Women’s Singles Title

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      The 24-year-old Belarusian player pushed Elena Rybakina of Kazakhstan to three sets to capture her first Grand Slam singles title.Aryna Sabalenka is no longer afraid of big stages.Overcoming a history of buckling under the pressure of late-round Grand Slam tennis, Sabalenka, the powerful 24-year-old from Belarus, came from behind to beat Elena Rybakina of Kazakhstan 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 in the women’s singles final of the Australian Open on Saturday.In a matchup of two of the biggest hitters in the sport, Sabalenka was a little more fearless and a few clicks more clinical than Rybakina in the crucial moments to cap off a dominant summer of tennis in Australia. It was Sabalenka’s first Grand Slam title in a rocky career that has included the kind of error-ridden, big-moment meltdowns from which some players almost never recover.Instead, the match proved a microcosm of Sabalenka’s career — a shaky start, filled with ill-timed double faults followed by a steadying midmatch recovery before a final-set display of raw power and precision that her opponent could not answer.And it all went down after Sabalenka decided last year to make a contrarian move in an era when athletes train their minds as hard as they train their bodies. Sabalenka fired her sports psychologist, deciding that if she was going to exorcise the demons of all those losses, she was going to have to do it on her own.On the final, anxious point, Rybakina sent a forehand long. In an instant, Sabalenka was on her back on the blue court, crying tears of joy — and relief.“It’s just the best day of my life right now,” she would say later.Holding the championship trophy on a stage a few minutes later, Sabalenka turned to her coaches and thanked them for sticking with her on an emotional ride to this first Grand Slam title.The 2023 Australian OpenThe year’s first Grand Slam event ran from Jan. 16 to Jan. 29 in Melbourne.Coaching That Feels Like ‘Cheating’: In-match coaching has always happened on the sly, but this year is the first time the Australian Open has allowed players to be coached from the stands.Rod Laver Likes What He Sees: At 84 years old, the man with his name on the stadium sits courtside at the Australian Open.India’s Superstar: Sania Mirza, who leaves tennis as a sleeping giant, has been a trailblazer nonetheless. “I would like to have a quieter life,” she said.Behind the Scenes: A coterie of billionaires, deep-pocketed companies and star players has engaged for months in a high-stakes battle to lead what they view as a once-in-a-generation opportunity to disrupt the sport.“We’ve been through a lot of downs,” she said. “It’s more about you than it is about me.”Hardly, of course, especially on a night when she had to overcome an opponent who had proven herself on a stage like this before.Rybakina, a native Russian who became a citizen of Kazakhstan five years ago in exchange for financial support, was aiming to back up her championship run at Wimbledon and announce herself as the major threat in women’s tennis.“I should have been more aggressive,” Rybakina said when it was over. “She was stronger mentally, physically.”Instead it was Sabalenka who showed the mettle needed to survive the kind of high-risk, high-reward tennis battle that had seemed inevitable from the first days of a tournament in which the conditions were ideal for the biggest, flattest hitters.When players first began arriving in Melbourne more than two weeks ago, they said the combination of heat, humidity and court preparation had made the balls difficult to spin, giving the edge to players who hammer their first serves and rips at nearly every rally ball as though they get extra credit for velocity.That suited Rybakina and Sabalenka just fine, as they played with the silver champion’s trophy sparkling on a pedestal in the corner of the court, in case either of them tried to pretend this was just another match.Entering the finals, Rybakina led the field with in aces with 45. Sabalenka was third with 29. They were first and second in hitting winners off their opponents’ serve, and at the top of the charts in peak serve speed, with both cracking 120 miles per hour.Subtle, deft, tennis this was not, and for Rybakina it was so different from her championship match at Wimbledon in July, when she played Ons Jabeur of Tunisia, one of the most creative players in the game.It was also different psychologically, too, and not only because she was doing something in Australia that she had already done before and that her opponent had not.Sabalenka, left, hugs Elena Rybakina after winning her first Grand Slam women’s singles title.William West/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesRybakina, a Russian through her childhood who became a citizen of Kazakhstan when the country promised to pay for her tennis training, spent the better part of two weeks during Wimbledon talking about whether she was actually Kazakh or Russian. She was also asked to answer for her native country’s invasion of Ukraine as she stampeded to the title. Her family still lives in Russia, and Wimbledon had prohibited players from Russia and Belarus from participating.That sidelined Sabalenka, one of the few players who can match, and often top, Rybakina thump for thump.Sabalenka’s power is different than Rybakina’s, though. Both players are six feet tall, but Sabalenka swings a tennis racket like a lumberjack wields an ax, screaming with exertion on every stroke, every bit of struggle and emotion visible in her eyes, while Rybakina’s long arms make her seem like a human trebuchet, slinging shots in silence and giving no hint of the turmoil stirring inside.As Sabalenka settled in and knotted the score, the match became a test of which brand of high-octane tennis could sustain the pressure of a final set for one of the biggest championships in the sport. As the reigning Wimbledon champion playing against a first-time Grand Slam finalist, Rybakina held a priceless edge in experience, but Sabalenka had all of the momentum, and the balls were jumping off her strings with a pop and a zip that Rybakina couldn’t match.The scoreboard showed them trading service games through the first six games, but Sabalenka was on cruise control and Rybakina had to keep finding big serves or tiny escape hatches to stay even.Sabalenka hugged the trophy after coming back from down a set to beat Rybakina.Martin Keep/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesServing in the seventh game Rybakina could no longer do it. On her third chance to get the crucial break of serve, Sabalenka sent her opponent scrambling after shots, then put away the game with an overhead shot from the middle of the court. Two games from the championship and in the driver’s seat, Sabalenka pumped her fist, took a few deep breaths and mouthfuls of water on the changeover, then strutted back onto the court to hammer her way to the title.An ace into the corner of the service box put her one game from cradling the trophy, which would be hers if she could just avoid wobbling.That Sabalenka was able to do so was the result of shifting how she thought about herself as a tennis player. “I started respecting myself more,” she said. “I started to understand that I am here because I worked so hard and I am a good player. I’m good enough to handle everything.”On Thursday, after finally making her first Grand Slam final on her fourth try, Sabalenka talked about having fired her sports psychologist. She decided that she was the only one who could find a way to overcome the mental struggles that doomed her in the past.“Every time hoping that someone will fix my problem, it’s not fixing my problem,” she said. “I just have to take this responsibility, and I just have to deal with that. I’m not working with a psychologist any more. I’m my psychologist.”For one moment the old Sabalenka reappeared as she tried to serve out the match at 5-4. She aced Rybakina to get to her first match point, then double-faulted to let Rybakina back in.Then, on Sabalenka’s fourth match point, Rybakina buckled, sending that forehand long, and an overwhelmed Sabalenka flat onto her back.Match over. Demons exorcised. And a new member of the sport’s most revered club. More

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      Andy Murray Wins Australian Open Thriller at 4 A.M.

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      Murray’s stirring five-set comeback against Thanasi Kokkinakis of Australia ended a day that also saw the men’s singles favorite Novak Djokovic win while playing with a hamstring injury.MELBOURNE, Australia — It was a night worthy of a knight, and Sir Andy Murray’s stirring comeback victory from two sets down against Thanasi Kokkinakis at the Australian Open also turned into one of the latest nights in tennis history.That is saying something in a sport that is often, too often, played into the wee hours of the morning, but Murray, a stouthearted Scotsman now playing tennis with an artificial hip, needed 5 hours 45 minutes to find a way to prevail against Kokkinakis, a big-serving Australian nearly 10 years his junior.Murray’s win, 4-6, 6-7 (4), 7-6 (5), 6-3, 7-5,  began Thursday and finished Friday at 4:05 a.m. with several thousand die-hard fans still making plenty of noise in Margaret Court Arena as some waved British flags for Murray and Australian and Greek flags for Kokkinakis.The end finally came with the 35-year-old Murray breaking serve at 5-5 and then holding his own to finish off the longest match of his career and earn, truly earn, a spot in the third round.The Australian Open has brought him plenty of heartache — he has lost in the final a record five times — but it is bringing him plenty of fulfillment this year.In the first round on Tuesday, he saved a match point and upset the No. 13 seed, Matteo Berrettini of Italy, prevailing in a fifth-set tiebreaker after 4:49.The duel with Kokkinakis, a 26-year-old wild-card entrant ranked 159th in the world, lasted nearly a full hour longer. But the quality and tenacity of play was often extraordinary down the stretch despite all that time on the court.“I just rely on that experience and that drive and my love of the game and competing and my respect for this event and the competition,” Murray said. “That’s why I kept going.”This was the third-latest recorded finish in the history of professional tennis, surpassed only by Alexander Zverev’s victory over Jenson Brooksby in Acapulco, Mexico, last year that ended at 4:54 a.m., and by Lleyton Hewitt’s victory over Marcos Baghdatis at the 2008 Australian Open that ended at 4:34 a.m.The 2023 Australian OpenThe year’s first Grand Slam tennis tournament runs from Jan. 16 to Jan. 29 in Melbourne.Taylor Townsend: A decade ago, she had to contend with the body-shaming of tennis leaders in the United States. Now, she’s determined to play the best tennis of her career.Caroline Garcia: The top player has spoken openly about her struggles with an eating disorder. At the Australian Open she is chasing her first Grand Slam singles title.Talent From China: Shang Juncheng, once the world’s top-ranked junior, is the youngest member of a promising new wave of players that also includes Wu Yibing and Zhang Zhizhen.Ben Shelton Goes Global: The 20-year-old American is ranked in the top 100 after a late-season surge last year. Now, he is embarking on his first full season on tour.It is a dubious honor to be on that list, but Brooksby, a 22-year-old Californian, at least got to play in the daylight on Thursday. He recorded the most significant victory of his career by upsetting the No. 2 seed Casper Ruud of Norway, 6-3, 7-5, 6-7 (4), 6-2, in Rod Laver Arena in the second round.That came less than 24 hours after Mackenzie McDonald, 27, another unseeded Californian, upset the injured Rafael Nadal, the No. 1 seed and the reigning champion, on the same court.Jenson Brooksby won Thursday against Casper Ruud, 6-3, 7-5, 6-7 (4), 6-2, at the Australian Open.Carl Recine/ReutersIn all, eight American men reached the round of 32 in Melbourne, the most at this Grand Slam tournament since 1996 when Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi were still in their primes.“First and foremost, Casper is a warrior,” Brooksby said. “I knew it would be a great battle out there. I was pretty confident with my level and just wanted to have fun competing.”Nadal, however, will not compete for at least a few weeks. He announced on Thursday that he had undergone a magnetic resonance imaging scan that showed an injury of the iliopsoas muscle in his left inner hip.Nadal, 36, will return to Spain for treatment and, according to his team, “the normal time estimated for complete recuperation is between six and eight weeks.” That would likely mean that Nadal will miss the next block of hardcourt events, including the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells, Calif. But if he recovers, Nadal could be ready to compete during the clay-court season. He has dominated on clay for close to two decades and could aim for a 15th singles title at the French Open.But Novak Djokovic, Nadal’s longtime rival who is chasing his record of 22 Grand Slam singles titles, remains in contention in Melbourne despite his own injury challenges. Djokovic, a nine-time Australian Open champion, started the tournament with a nagging left hamstring injury. He aggravated it on Thursday night in his victory, 6-1, 6-7 (5), 6-2, 6-0, over Enzo Couacaud, a French qualifier ranked 191st who sprained an ankle early in the match but managed to continue.Late in the second set, Djokovic, with his left hamstring tightly wrapped, began wincing and landing awkwardly on some shots, looking far from eager to slide into his signature defensive splits. He even limped and pulled up as he ran to his left for a backhand at one stage.With a third-round matchup against Grigor Dimitrov scheduled for Saturday, Djokovic conceded that his situation going forward in the tournament was “not ideal.”“I am worried,” he said of his injury. “I mean, I cannot say that I am not. I have reason to be worried. But at the same time, I have to accept the circumstances and try to adjust myself with my team.”Djokovic said he was minimizing or eliminating practice sessions on days between matches. In 2021, he won his ninth Australian Open after tearing an abdominal muscle in the third round.“Somehow I pushed it through and won the tournament,” Djokovic said. “But it’s different now, obviously. I don’t know how my body’s going to react. I hope for the best. I hope for the positive outcome. I’ll take it day by day, match by match and see how it goes.”Novak Djokovic stretched during his second round-match. “I am worried,” he said later of his hamstring injury.Loren Elliott/Reuters Earlier in the day, Ruud, the affable Norwegian star who reached the French Open and U.S. Open finals last year, could not solve the riddle of Brooksby’s unconventional game.Theirs was a grinding match, full of rallies whose shot count extended into double digits. Though Brooksby won the vast majority of those — quite an achievement against a baseliner as accomplished as Ruud — he could not convert any of the three match points he had on his own serve at 5-3 in the third set.Distraught, Brooksby sat in his chair on the changeover shouting “How, how how?”Ruud won the third set in a tiebreaker, which could have been the cue for Brooksby to fold. Instead, he walked back onto the court after a break in the locker room and broke Ruud twice in a row to take a 3-0 lead. Then, after losing his serve, he broke Ruud again at love to reclaim full command of the match.“I’m just really proud of my mental resolve there, after the third-set battle didn’t go my way, to turn it around,” Brooksby said.It was the standout victory of Brooksby’s career, and it was a bad day all around for No. 2 seeds. Ons Jabeur, the No. 2 seed in the women’s singles tournament, was defeated after midnight, 6-1, 5-7, 6-1, by Marketa Vondrousova, an unseeded Czech lefthander.Tennis is a draining, mood-swinging sport, full of surprises, and the bottom quarter of the men’s singles draw is now a zone of great opportunity for outsiders, including the 66th-ranked Murray and five unseeded Americans: Brooksby, Ben Shelton, J.J. Wolf, Michael Mmoh and Tommy Paul.The surprise is that the American men’s surge in Melbourne does not include their leader: the No. 8 seed Taylor Fritz, who was upset on Thursday in five sets, 6-7 (4), 7-6 (2), 6-4, 6-7 (6), 6-2, by Alexei Popyrin, another Australian wild-card entrant.Popyrin will now face Shelton, the 20-year-old son of the former tennis pro Bryan Shelton. Ben Shelton turned professional last year after winning the N.C.A.A. men’s singles title for the University of Florida, where his father is the coach, and is making his first trip outside the U.S.Brooksby will face Paul, and Wolf will face Mmoh, who made it into the main draw as a lucky loser after a withdrawal. Murray, meanwhile, was wondering if he was ever going to get to sleep.“Thanks so much to everyone for staying,” he said to the crowd after his victory. “It’s ridiculously late.” More

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      Rafael Nadal Loses at Australian Open After Injury

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      Nadal, who has won 22 Grand Slams, lost in the second round to Mackenzie McDonald, an American who has never cracked the top 40 in the world rankings.MELBOURNE, Australia — The end came all at once for Rafael Nadal, and then it happened slowly.Down one set and on the ropes against Mackenzie McDonald in the second round of the Australian Open on Wednesday, Nadal injured his hip while chasing down a shot in the eighth game of the second set. His eyes, filled with concern, immediately turned to his coaches seated courtside at Rod Laver Arena. He then crouched in the corner to catch his breath. Moments later, he returned to continue, because for Nadal, the one thing worse than losing is quitting.Knowing his day and his tournament were all but done, he watched two aces blaze by, bringing him to the brink of going down two-sets-to-love against McDonald, a 27-year-old American who has never cracked the top 40 in the world rankings. McDonald had played the match of his life for nearly two sets, then did what he needed to do to close out a 6-4, 6-4, 7-5 victory over an ailing Nadal, who hobbled around the court for nearly another hour like a wounded deer.Nadal’s injury came after McDonald, a former U.C.L.A. player, had spent more than 90 minutes pasting the lines with his shots when he needed to most. Nadal, the No. 1 seed, called for a trainer, left the court to receive medical treatment for what appeared to be an injury to his midsection, near his right hip, then returned and played on.Nadal receiving medical treatment on the court at Rod Laver Arena on Wednesday.Cameron Spencer/Getty ImagesThe 36-year-old Nadal struggled to move and chase after balls with the abandon that has always been the hallmark of his game. He could barely generate power from his backhand. He somehow stayed even with McDonald through the first 10 games of the second set, hobbling around, taking wild cuts to try to end points quickly. But McDonald put just enough shots out of Nadal’s reach to break his serve in the 11th, then clinched the match when Nadal netted one last backhand return.When it was over, Nadal left to a rousing ovation, taking an extra few moments to turn and wave to the crowd.In a news conference 45 minutes later, the defending Australian Open champion said his disappointment was unimaginable, his voice cracking slightly as he spoke about suffering yet another injury in a career, despite all of its success, that has been filled with them.“I can’t say that I am not destroyed mentally this time because I would be lying,” he said.The loss was the latest in a string of defeats that have plagued him recently as he has battled injuries and a wounded psyche. He also has had to adjust to fatherhood after the birth of his first child, a son, in October.Nadal had lost six of his previous seven matches coming into the tournament, with several of those coming against a younger generation of players. Once they would have been awed playing against a nearly unbeatable opponent. Now, they walk onto the court knowing that Nadal, whose body is banged up from playing an incredibly physical style over his career, is as vulnerable as he has been at any point in his career.“He’s an incredible champion,” McDonald said of Nadal after the match. “He’s never going to give up.”The 2023 Australian OpenThe year’s first Grand Slam tennis tournament runs from Jan. 16 to Jan. 29 in Melbourne.Taylor Townsend: A decade ago, she had to contend with the body-shaming of tennis leaders in the United States. Now, she’s determined to play the best tennis of her career.Caroline Garcia: The top player has spoken openly about her struggles with an eating disorder. At the Australian Open she is chasing her first Grand Slam singles title.Talent From China: Shang Juncheng, once the world’s top-ranked junior, is the youngest member of a promising new wave of players that also includes Wu Yibing and Zhang Zhizhen.Ben Shelton Goes Global: The 20-year-old American is ranked in the top 100 after a late-season surge last year. Now, he is embarking on his first full season on tour.McDonald’s win was the latest in a string of successes by Americans against Nadal, a 22-time Grand Slam champion. For nearly two decades, they could barely touch him, especially in Grand Slam tournaments. That changed in September at the U.S. Open, when Frances Tiafoe, 24, knocked him out in the fourth round. Tommy Paul and Taylor Fritz beat Nadal later in the fall in other tournaments, when the Spaniard was trying to return late in the season from an abdominal injury.Wednesday, it was McDonald’s turn, in a scene that was eerily reminiscent of last year’s Wimbledon quarterfinals, when Nadal tore an abdominal muscle while playing Fritz. On that day he somehow prevailed in five sets, even as his coaches and relatives urged him to quit. Those discussions didn’t materialize Wednesday. His wife, sister, father and coaches sat mostly silent, letting the match reach its inevitable end.McDonald met Nadal’s power and topspin with his own during the match.Martin Keep/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesNadal said he had felt discomfort in his hip in recent days but nothing like what he felt in that crucial moment late in the second set.“I don’t know what’s going on, if it’s muscle, if it’s joint,” he said. “I have history in the hip. I had to do treatments in the past, address a little. It was not this amount of problem. Now I feel I cannot move.”Before the injury, McDonald stood on the baseline and beat Nadal at his own game, meeting Nadal’s power and topspin with his own flatter version of it, curling forehands just above the net and sending Nadal chasing the ball from corner to corner. When Nadal hit harder, so did McDonald. He broke Nadal’s serve early in the first and second set and kept Nadal under pressure all day, then remained steady as Nadal played through the pain.The defeat marked Nadal’s earliest exit from a Grand Slam tournament since he lost in the first round of the Australian Open seven years ago.McDonald caught a break from the inclement weather that has plagued the tournament since Tuesday, drenching Melbourne with rain. The rain on Wednesday had forced the closure of the roof, which the players say slows down the pace of the ball. Throughout the match, Nadal struggled to hit through the back of the court, his ball slowing just enough to allow McDonald to catch up to it and take his best rips.Nadal has experienced all the highs and lows of the sport during the last 18 months. He missed most of the second half of 2021 because of a series of injuries, then ventured to Melbourne a year ago, just seven weeks after being on crutches. With his foot chronically injured, he thought then it might be his last opportunity to play in Australia.He quickly returned to form and won the final in Melbourne after being two sets down against Daniil Medvedev of Russia. For the first time in 13 years, he was the Australian Open champion.At the French Open, he received injections to numb the pain in his foot before every match. Nevertheless, he rolled to his 14th title at that tournament, but left on crutches.For Nadal, the loss was the latest in a string of defeats that have plagued him recently as he has battled injuries and a wounded psyche.Loren Elliott/ReutersHe entered Wimbledon, his first official match on grass in three years, without playing a warm-up tournament. He won all five matches he played but had to withdraw before the semifinals because of the torn abdominal.He played just one hardcourt match before the U.S. Open and lost to Tiafoe in four sets in the fourth round. Tiafoe was the first American-born player to beat Nadal at a Grand Slam in nearly two decades.In late September, Nadal partnered with Roger Federer in the Swiss champion’s final competitive match. Nadal tried to get healthy for two late-season indoor tournaments, neither of which went well.Nadal arrived in Australia in December to play for Spain in the inaugural United Cup, a rare competition with both men and women. He lost both of his matches, extending one of the roughest stretches of his career.At other moments of disappointment, Nadal has been able to appear philosophical, expressing thanks for the good fortune of his life. Wednesday was different, he said, as he struggled to do that.“Can’t come here and say, lying, that the life is fantastic and staying positive and keep fighting,” he said. “Not now. Tomorrow starts another day. Now it’s a tough moment. It’s a tough day, and you need to accept that, and keep going. You know, in the end, I can’t complain about my life at all. So just in terms of sports and in terms of injuries and tough moments, I mean, that’s another one. Just can’t say that I am not destroyed mentally at this time.”Nadal will likely take a break to get healthy again, then, if he can, turn his focus to the spring clay-court season and the French Open. It is a tournament he has won 14 times, and he calls it the most special of his career.“I like playing tennis,” he said. “I know it’s not forever. I like to feel myself competitive. I like to fight for the things that I have been fighting for almost half of my life or even more.All that success will mean nothing, though, if Nadal can’t maintain his health, something that only gets harder as athletes age.Ultimately, that may be the one opponent that proves too tough, even for Nadal, but if there is any chance of delaying the inevitable a little longer, he will take it, regardless of the sacrifice.“When you like do one thing,” he said. “Sacrifices always make sense. More

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      Extreme Heat, Torrential Rain Plagues Australian Open

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      At the first Grand Slam tournament of the tennis season, the heat got so intense that play was halted for most of the afternoon. In the evening, a torrential rain fell, halting play once more.MELBOURNE, Australia — This country has a well-earned reputation as a land of extremes: fatally poisonous snakes, deadly insects, killer crocodiles, drenching rains and brutal heat.The Australian Open got a fair dose of that Tuesday — well, not so much the killer bugs or crocs or snakes, though the park next to the tennis center does have signs warning visitors to beware of snakes. The heat got so intense that play was halted for most of the afternoon. In the evening, a torrential rain fell, halting play once more.Keeping with the theme of extreme, somewhere in the midst of all this weather, Andy Murray, the 35-year-old three-time Grand Slam winner and former world No. 1, somehow managed to turn back the clock and beat Matteo Berrettini of Italy in five sets, including a deciding super-tiebreaker at the end of the fifth set. The final score line looked like this: 6-3, 6-3, 4-6, 6-7 (7), 7-6 (10-6). The match lasted 4 hours 49 minutes. Murray, who is in the middle of a yearslong comeback from major hip surgery, saved a match point and played the final set with blood coming out of his knee after skinning it on the ground trying to win it in four.“I feel tired,” Murray said in his news conference a little more than two hours after he finished.“Impressive what he could do after so many surgeries, after all the kilometers that he ran in his career,” Berrettini said of Murray. “It just shows how much he loves the game, how much he loves these kind of matches.”Murray and Berrettini were lucky. They played in Rod Laver, one of three courts here with roofs, which were closed when organizers announced that while temperatures had not hit triple digits, the four climate factors they consider when deciding whether to halt play — air temperature, radiant heat, humidity and wind speed — had all tipped the scale.The 2023 Australian OpenThe year’s first Grand Slam tennis tournament runs from Jan. 16 to Jan. 29 in Melbourne.Missing Stars: Carlos Alcaraz, Naomi Osaka and Nick Kyrgios have all pulled out of the tournament. Alcaraz’s withdrawal means that the Australian Open will be without the men’s No. 1 singles player.Holger Rune’s Rise: Last year, the 19-year-old broke into the top 10, but not without some unwanted attention. We spoke to the young Dane ahead of his second Australian Open.Ben Shelton Goes Global: The 20-year-old American is ranked in the top 100 after a late-season surge last year. Now, he is embarking on his first full season on tour.A Waiting Game: Tennis matches can last a long time. Here’s how players waiting to take the court for the next match stay sharp.Taylor Fritz of the United States, who beat Nikoloz Basilashvili of Georgia in four sets, said he had felt far more discomfort in Washington, D.C., last summer or at the U.S. Open some years.“It’s dry heat,” said Fritz, who has spent plenty of afternoons in smothering humidity in Florida. “I don’t think it’s as bad.”The weather played havoc with the schedule, forcing many matches to postpone until Wednesday.Quinn Rooney/Getty ImagesThe weather played havoc with the schedule, and with rain forecast on and off through the evening it appeared that plenty of matches might not finish until Wednesday.If you like upsets, Tuesday was not your day. Murray’s was the big one. Berrettini, a finalist at Wimbledon in 2021, was the 13th seed, and with his big serve and forehand he can be as dangerous as anyone other than the nine-time champion Novak Djokovic, who beat Roberto Carballés Baena of Sapin in straight sets in the late match on Rod Laver, a court and time slot that Djokovic loves.Murray credited a three-week journey to Florida last year to train with Ivan Lendl, the coach who has been with him for many of his biggest wins. The past success creates trust, Murray said, and the confidence he needs to compete with players a decade or more his junior. He will face the winner of the match between Thanasi Kokkinakis, a hometown favorite, and Fabio Fognini of Italy on Thursday, when the high temperature is expected to be just 64 degrees Fahrenheit.It’s worth noting in the wake of Berrettini’s loss that there is some chatter going around Melbourne Park and social media about a Netflix curse. The thinking is that if you were featured in the Netflix series “Break Point,” the tennis gods are coming for you.Nick Kyrgios, Paula Badosa, and Ajla Tomljanovic all featured heavily in “Break Point” and had to pull out with injuries. Now Berrettini is out. Then again, Fritz and Felix Auger-Aliassime have survived. Eventually, the tennis gods come for everyone except one woman and one man.As for Wednesday, Rafael Nadal is scheduled to be back in action against Mackenzie McDonald of the United States in the afternoon, but the real star power is on the night schedule.Coco Gauff, the American star who is only 18, takes on Emma Raducanu, who won the U.S. Open in 2021 as a qualifier and has graced magazine covers ever since. If ever there was an early-round match worth setting an alarm for 3 a.m., this one might be it. More

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      Nick Kyrgios Withdraws From Australian Open With Knee Injury

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      Kyrgios, the temperamental star who was a finalist at Wimbledon last year, had battled soreness in his left knee but was hoping to play.MELBOURNE, Australia — After spending the past week receiving all the laurels of a hometown favorite, Nick Kyrgios withdrew from the Australian Open on Monday with a knee injury, a little more than 24 hours ahead of his scheduled first-round match.In an interview Friday, Kyrgios, the temperamental Australian star who was a finalist at Wimbledon last year, said he had been battling soreness in his left knee during the off-season, but he expected to be able to play in the year’s first Grand Slam.Those hopes took a turn for the worse Friday after a charity match with Novak Djokovic.“Extremely disappointed,” Kyrgios said during a news conference Monday afternoon at Melbourne Park. “Pretty brutal. One of the most important tournaments of my career.”After climbing from outside the top 100 in 2021 to play deep into two Grand Slam tournaments last year, Kyrgios was among the favorites heading into the Australian Open, where he won the men’s doubles title last year with his fellow Australian Thanasi Kokkinakis.The first sign that things were not going as planned emerged in late December, when Kyrgios pulled out of the United Cup, a team competition, just before the start of the event. He then withdrew from an Australian Open tuneup tournament in Adelaide, hoping he would be healthy enough by the start of the Australian Open this week.The 2023 Australian OpenThe year’s first Grand Slam tennis tournament runs from Jan. 16 to Jan. 29 in Melbourne.Missing Stars: Carlos Alcaraz, Naomi Osaka and Nick Kyrgios have all pulled out of the tournament. Alcaraz’s withdrawal means that the Australian Open will be without the men’s No. 1 singles player.Holger Rune’s Rise: Last year, the 19-year-old broke into the top 10, but not without some unwanted attention. We spoke to the young Dane ahead of his second Australian Open.Ben Shelton Goes Global: The 20-year-old American is ranked in the top 100 after a late-season surge last year. Now, he is embarking on his first full season on tour.A Waiting Game: Tennis matches can last a long time. Here’s how players waiting to take the court for the next match stay sharp.Will Maher, Kyrgios’s longtime physiotherapist, said during the Monday news conference that Kyrgios underwent a magnetic resonance imaging test last week that revealed both a cyst and a slight tear in his meniscus. Maher said Kyrgios would go home to Canberra for a procedure later this week. He will spend February rehabilitating the knee and is hoping to be healthy enough to play in March in the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells, Calif.“There’s a parameniscal cyst growing in his left meniscus, which is the result of a small tear in his lateral meniscus,” Maher said. “It’s not a significant injury in the sense that it’s going to be career-threatening, or anything like that.”Maher said Kyrgios had done everything he could to be able to compete. Last week, he underwent a procedure to drain the cyst. He also received injections to relieve the pressure, and while there was temporary relief, the soreness increased in recent days. Maher said playing could risk creating a more significant injury, such as a tear in his anterior cruciate ligament, or A.C.L.Kyrgios said that as soon as he lost in the quarterfinals of the U.S. Open in September, his mind shifted to the Australian Open, where he liked his chances on hardcourts in front of raucous home crowds.“I always wanted to just do everything right and train right and tick every box, and just be ready,” Kyrgios said. He added: “Obviously, this coming around is just bad timing. But that’s life. Injury is a part of the sport.”He said he was confident that he would be able to regain the form that made him one of the world’s most feared players, but surgery is the only way to get there.“Every time I land on serve or push off my serve, you can see on the side of my knee there’s like a little lump,” he said. “That lump will eventually just get bigger and bigger. There’s pressure on my knee, obviously hinders my movement. The only real way to get rid of it is to open up and then just get rid of it.”Kyrgios has another serious issue to deal with in Canberra in the coming weeks.In early February, he is due in court to face a charge of common assault stemming from an altercation with an ex-girlfriend, Chiara Passari, in December 2021. Kyrgios has declined to discuss the matter since it became public during his run to the Wimbledon final in July.Common assault is the least serious assault charge in Australia, but it implies that the victim experienced immediate, unlawful violence, or the threat of it, though not bodily injury. Kyrgios’s lawyers have said they will mount a defense focused on mental illness, citing his history of depression and substance abuse, struggles Kyrgios has said will always be with him but that he now has under control. If the court accepts this defense and dismisses the case, it could then decide to impose a treatment plan. The maximum penalty for common assault is two years’ imprisonment. More

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      Australian Open Organizers Hope the Drama Stays on the Court

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      Covid-19, wildfires and extreme heat have all disrupted the tournament in the past.Craig Tiley doesn’t sleep much. It’s a habit he picked up during three years of army training in his native South Africa.But as chief executive of Tennis Australia and tournament director for the Australian Open, which begins Sunday at Melbourne Park, since 2006, Tiley finds that slumber is overrated and inconvenient.“Maybe I get that sense of fear of missing out,” said Tiley, who was the tennis coach for the University of Illinois team that went 32-0 in 2003. “I always want to be up and around, especially when you’re under pressure.”There has been no shortage of difficult situations for Tiley and the Australian Open over the last several years. Often lauded as the happy slam by players and spectators, the open, which has had memorable tennis over the years, as when Serena Williams won a three-set battle with her sister Venus in 2003, has taken hits that have threatened the relaxed atmosphere and the tournament itself.“Unfortunately, the tournament’s been plagued by some very bad luck the last few years, said Rennae Stubbs, a Sydney native and former world No. 1 doubles player who is now a television commentator. “It’s been a bit of a disaster, and all of it completely out of the tournament’s control.”The fires that plagued Australia in 2020 enveloped Melbourne in a smoky haze.Getty ImagesThree years ago, wildfires filled the skies over Melbourne with smoke so thick that play was hindered and the tournament almost postponed. A year later, Covid-19 restrictions were so stringent that players were forced to quarantine in hotels, many unable to practice until days before the start of play. And last year an unvaccinated Novak Djokovic was deported before he ever got to hit a ball.The extreme heat of the Australian summer is nothing new and has disrupted play in the past, as in the 110-degree temperatures that had players wilting in 2014. That year, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and Caroline Wozniacki complained that their sneakers and water bottles were melting into the hard court. One player, Peng Shuai, vomited on court and another, Frank Dancevic, fainted.In 2018, Simona Halep spent four hours receiving intravenous fluids at a Melbourne hospital after she lost an almost three-hour, three-set final to Wozniacki in the sweltering heat.Djokovic accused the sport of not caring enough about the health of players. The tournament then updated its excessive heat policy that takes into consideration on-court temperatures, the strength of the sun, air temperature in the shade, relative humidity and wind speed. If certain thresholds are met, matches can be suspended and the roofs closed on the main show courts.The intense heat helped spawn the 2020 fires. Some were so close to Melbourne that tournament officials considered postponing play because of the thick smoke and poor air quality.Also that year, there were protests at the tournament, including by the tennis greats Martina Navratilova and John McEnroe over Margaret Court, the former Australian player, after she accepted an invitation to return to Melbourne Park to celebrate the 50th anniversary of her winning all four majors, called the Grand Slam, in 1970. The park’s secondary stadium was named after her in 2003.Court, who holds the record for winning the most major singles titles with 24, is now a Pentecostal pastor in Perth and created a divide in her homeland because of her opposition to gay marriage. The tournament went ahead with its celebration of Court, but did not give her a microphone to speak to the crowd.“When you get a stadium named after you, you have to understand that people who are walking through those doors may be gay, and insulting those people is totally unacceptable,” Stubbs said. “You are essentially an ambassador for our sport and for our country. You can think what you like but just don’t say it.”Tennis players were quarantined for 14 days upon arrival in Melbourne for the 2021 tournament as the Covid-19 pandemic continued to rage. Asanka Ratnayake/Getty ImagesThe open signals the official start of a new season, which is one of the reasons players love it. Players are eager to show off new strokes, new coaches, altered bodies from hours spent in the gym during the tours’ brief off-season and new sponsored tennis clothing.“Everyone’s coming from cold climates to the sun of the Southern Hemisphere,” said Mark Woodforde, who captured 12 doubles major titles, 11 of them with fellow Australian Todd Woodbridge. “They’ve had their holidays, are well rested physically and mentally, and they’re eager and excited to be back.”That changed in 2021 because of the pandemic. Determined to hold the tournament in spite of heavy governmental restrictions, Tiley pushed back the start date to allow time to put players on chartered planes and have them quarantine for two weeks in hotels before they were allowed to compete.Despite his efforts at creating a bubble to keep everyone safe, several people tested positive, prompting lockdowns with no time off to practice for many players. Some players even improvised their exercise routines by hitting tennis balls against shuttered windows and turning beds on their sides to serve as backboards.Then last year, Djokovic created an international incident when he arrived in Melbourne unvaccinated — a breach of Australian protocols — and was deported before he was ever allowed to step foot on the court. The tournament was saved by some extraordinary on-court action, including championships by Rafael Nadal and the hometown hero Ashleigh Barty.Djokovic, then the reigning champion, refused to be vaccinated against the coronavirus and was deported from Australia ahead of the 2022 Open.Darko Bandic/Associated Press“It’s a real testament to Craig and his staff that, despite all the obstacles with Covid, they were able to put on the event the last two years while still playing by the rules,” said Rajeev Ram, who won the 2020 Australian Open doubles tournament with his partner, Joe Salisbury, and played for Tiley at Illinois. “It would have been easy to just say, ‘No tournament,’ but they got creative, and the players really benefited from that.”Another reason the players refer to the open as the happy slam is because of the way they are treated.“We design this event around having fun,” Tiley said. “Our whole mission and position is ‘playful premium.’”For fans, there is an on-site beach, dozens of restaurants and bars, a field full of family activities and a water park.Players are lured by grants to pay for their travel, even for junior competitors for the first time this year. They are also treated to a variety of medical services, including a new foot treatment area; new performance spaces, including three gyms, a preparation/recovery center and ice baths; and an area that offers a nutrition bar and mindfulness activities. There is also a beauty salon and on-site tax advisers.Despite its rocky recent history, the Australian Open is often known as the happy slam because of its spirit and the way visitors are treated. Alana Holmberg for The New York Times“The environment they create is akin to the way Aussies treat people,” Woodforde said. “The tournament doesn’t ever say no to a request. They work hard to create a stress-free environment for everyone. They want people to say, ‘Do we have to go home?’”Tiley said that Australians love their sport and entertainment.“They would choose to invest in that before anything else,” he said. “That’s a great attribute to have from your fans when you’re in this business.”After all the tumult of the last few years, Tiley is optimistic about a turnaround. By mid-December, he said, ticket sales for ground passes were up by more than 30 percent compared with last year. “We’re seeing this absolute pent-up demand for everything.”“Our ultimate responsibility is to deliver a global tennis championship,” Tiley added. “These tournaments in London, Paris, New York and, of course, Melbourne, are massive entertainment events with multimillions in global audiences. At the end of the day, my job is to run the best event possible under the circumstances.” More

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      Audio Technology Helps Blind People Follow Australian Open Tennis

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      At the Australian Open tennis tournament, new technology is translating the movement of the ball into sounds to help blind and low-vision fans follow the action.Listen to This ArticleThere’s a new way for sports fans to follow tennis. Hear it here.To hear more audio stories from publications like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.Rapid, echoing pops go off in Michael Marshall’s ears when he listens to an Australian Open tennis match, followed closely by high- and low-pitched clinks. Three pops on the left signal that the ball landed close to the line; a low-pitched clink means that the player returned it with a backhand stroke.Without context, these noises might sound like arcade sound effects or some new version of Morse code — but each one is a message meant to help people who are blind or have limited vision follow the game. A new technology, called Action Audio, is being tested on a large scale for the first time at this year’s Australian Open, where every match in the Rod Laver Arena is available on a livestream with this accessibility feature.Marshall, 35, of Melbourne, is an avid tennis fan who listens to the tournament on the radio every year. He said Action Audio had added a layer to his experience, allowing him to more clearly track the ball during a point.“Everything is like, oh, yes, this is the final piece that I’m missing,” Marshall said. He later added, “It gives you those cues that you never really had before.”He and other blind sports fans often listen to radio descriptions of games instead of watching them on TV. But with serves flying at over 100 miles an hour and groundstrokes routinely exceeding 80, even the most descriptive radio announcer can’t talk fast enough to capture every nuance of the action on a tennis court. Details like how close the ball landed to a line, how fast it traveled and what direction it moved are not always described, according to Machar Reid, head of innovation at Tennis Australia.“They might do it on one shot, but it’s hard to do on every single shot on the rally,” he said of radio announcers.Tennis Australia partnered with Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, and the digital design and communications agency AKQA to develop Action Audio in 2019. Reid said that tennis was the ideal sport to begin with because of its existing ball-tracking technology. In general, a fully equipped tennis court has 10 or 12 cameras collecting data around 50 times a second. That data is typically used to make quick calls about whether a shot landed in or out of play.Action Audio’s technology converts the data into 3-D sound — a process that takes less than a second — allowing it to be broadcast alongside live radio commentary.Chatai Goncu, a data scientist, operated a MIDI controller pad to make audio adjustments for Action Audio.Alana Holmberg for The New York TimesThe sounds include one, two or three blips to indicate how close the ball is to the sideline or baseline. If the ball is close to the line, three blips will go off. If the ball lands farther inside the line, two blips sound. One blip means the ball was hit toward the middle of the court.The sounds come through the left speaker if the ball was played to that side of the court, and through the right speaker if it landed on the right.As the ball moves around, it jingles and rattles. The sound is loudest when the player strikes the ball, and it fades away gradually as the ball travels. High-pitched clinks indicate a forehand, while low-pitched clinks indicate a backhand.In the future, Reid would love to integrate Action Audio into TV broadcasts and develop it for other sports that use optical tracking systems, such as baseball, he said.One challenge in developing sport soundscapes is determining how many actions can be captured and translated to sound before the audio becomes overwhelming or distracting, according to Tim Devine, the executive innovation director at AKQA.“Do you want to know where the ball is, or do you want to follow a player?” he asked.To figure it out, AKQA and Tennis Australia reached out to fans to ask what they found most interesting about tennis and then surveyed blind people to see which sounds worked best. Developers tried to use sounds that were already familiar to users, such as the jingling rattle of the bell ball used in blind tennis, Reid said.The developers are also collecting feedback from people who tune into this year’s Action Audio livestream, which has drawn listeners from about 70 countries.Umpires observed a match at the Australian Open. Data from cameras around the court is translated into the sound that Action Audio broadcasts.Alana Holmberg for The New York TimesKarl Belanger, an accessibility analyst for the National Federation of the Blind in the United States, is among those listeners. He was listening to the audio stream provided by Tennis Australia last week when he heard an advertisement for Action Audio. He was excited to tune in but became frustrated because the design of the site was not fully compatible with the screen-reader technology that blind people use to decipher web pages.“That one layer of it just kind of mars the whole experience when you have to fight with the player to even experience it,” Belanger said.Developers acknowledged Action Audio was a work in progress and said that AKQA and Tennis Australia would work to make the player more accessible.To get the full benefit of Action Audio, listeners need headphones or speakers that can separate sounds for the left and right ears. Without this, Belanger said, the audio is not as helpful.Belanger suggested other improvements — such as a sound for when the ball hits the net — but overall, he said, the audio soundscape was well designed. As a sports fan, he now wants the same concept used for every sport.For some blind and low-vision fans, Action Audio makes it easier to enjoy the game alongside friends and family. Kala Petronijevic, 11, who is from Melbourne, is blind in her right eye and has limited vision in her left eye.Kala has been playing blind tennis since she was 5. She is a big fan of the sport, but she didn’t always enjoy watching games. She used to have to constantly ask her father who had hit the ball and what was going on.“It was hard following the game,” Kala said. “I wouldn’t really be interested because I wouldn’t know what was going on. But with Action Audio, I can follow the game promptly.”Audio produced by More