Rublev, Andrey (1997- )

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    To Beat the Best at the ATP Finals, Players May Have to Mix Things Up

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    Analysts say it is a good strategy against strong defensive players, which can put them in an uncomfortable position.The ATP Finals, scheduled to run from Sunday through Nov. 19, is more than the most prestigious men’s tournament outside of the Grand Slams, it is also an existential conundrum.The exclusive singles draw features the eight best players in the world, leaving no easy wins and raising the question of whether a player must change his game over the course of the week to best the best of the best.The answer is a highly qualified “yes,” with a giant “but” attached. Paul Annacone, the Tennis Channel analyst who coached Pete Sampras and Roger Federer, said changes should be minor, especially since the early matches are round-robin, meaning a player can lose one match and still survive.“I’m a big believer in figuring out your own identity and trusting what got you to the year-end championships,” he said. “Then you just have to do it just a little better than the guy on the other side of the net that day.”Charging the net, which can shorten rallies and help players take control of the action, is one tactic that the players can use against the game’s best defenders, like Novak Djokovic and Daniil Medvedev, or against power sluggers like Jannik Sinner and Andrey Rublev, but it’s precisely those players’ skills that make coming up to the net after hitting a groundstroke such a risky move.Still, Jimmy Arias, who is also a Tennis Channel analyst, said it’s one way to survive the week.“It’s so hard to hit through base liners like Alexander Zverev and Medvedev, especially on a slower court,” he said, “so if you don’t come to the net against Medvedev, you’re kind of an idiot. If he hits a ridiculous passing shot from the stands, just clap and say, ‘Let me see you do that again.’”Daniil Medvedev charging the net to return a shot during a tournament in Vienna last month. Medvedev has gained a reputation as one of the top defenders playing today.Eva Manhart/APA/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe danger comes, Arias says, if you simply try to force your way to the net against an opponent who is dictating the points, though he adds that, given the quality of the opponents in Turin, Italy, that may become the only option.Patrick McEnroe, an ESPN analyst, agreed, saying that “the ability to finish points, especially at the net, helps exponentially” against such elite defensive players. Medvedev, who is known for stubbornly staying extremely far behind the baseline, gives himself time to reach almost any deep shot. The best plan is to come to the net or hit short-angle balls against him, McEnroe said, but noted that Medvedev succeeds because many players (Djokovic and Carlos Alcaraz excepted) cannot execute that tactic well enough to beat him.McEnroe added that the court in Turin, which is indoors, was low-bouncing (forcing opponents to lift attempted passing shots) and relatively slow, though indoor courts felt quicker because there were no elements like wind.“That favors the aggressive player, but not to the extent that it did back in the day, so you need more versatility now,” he said. “That’s why Federer and Djokovic have dominated there.” (Federer won six times; Djokovic is seeking his seventh title.)He emphasized that changing strategies can be more nuanced than simply charging in. He suggested using the forecourt more often and hitting drop shots, low slices and short angle balls.“It puts the other player in uncomfortable positions and allows you to then take the initiative on the next shot,” he said, adding that this is something they now stress at the John McEnroe Tennis Academy, the school launched by his brother, where he is co-director.Carlos Alcaraz playing a drop shot against an opponent in Ohio in August. According to the ESPN analyst Patrick McEnroe, Alcaraz has been playing these kinds of nuanced shots “at least since he was 13.”Matthew Stockman/Getty Images“This is the biggest thing that has changed with Carlos Alcaraz, who has been playing those shots at least since he was 13,” McEnroe said. “He has the huge firepower and athleticism that these other players do, but now you’re seeing the need to move better and use that part of the court strategically. You’re seeing shots you never thought about, and players are using them consistently.”Arias said that breaking down an opponent by making him change his positioning so he felt uncomfortable — something Federer would do with a short, low slice and that Alcaraz does with the drop shot — was essential.“It’s not just needed for this tournament, but to beat the best you need that all year, but it’s something that’s slightly lacking in the game today,” he said.While Zverev and Medvedev tend to camp at the baseline and let it rip, the analysts cite Rublev, whom Annacone called “so dominant from the back of the court,” as the most one-dimensional of the top players. Arias said Rublev and Sinner “play straight ahead, hitting it hard without opening the court much.”But Annacone and McEnroe said Sinner was improving in this regard because of his coach Darren Cahill. “He’s getting better at playing with subtlety and nuance,” McEnroe said, adding that Holger Rune also “has the potential to play that sort of game.”All three analysts say that when Stefanos Tsitsipas is in top form, he is versatile and one of the better volleyers.Annacone said that a player like Sinner or Rublev could win most matches during the year with their firepower, but that “each of these top players, aside from Novak, can be vulnerable on any given day against other elite players.”Djokovic, as always, remains the exception, even among the exceptional. He has lost just five times this year and is 33-1 on hard courts; since 2012 he is an astounding 108-15 indoors. (Alcaraz would have slotted in there with Djokovic, but he has scuffled a bit since Wimbledon.)So Annacone acknowledged that while players can’t overhaul their identity for this tournament, when they reach the semifinals and possibly face Alcaraz and Djokovic, “you need to be creative and think outside the box,” adding that changing tactics midmatch was easier now that coaching is allowed between points.“You have to be confident enough to do things a little differently, to adjust and adapt on your feet,” he said. “Try it, sometimes you’ll miss, but that’s life.” More

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      U.S. Open Draws Pave the Way for a Rematch of Djokovic vs. Alcaraz in Final

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      Novak Djokovic, the No. 2 seed, does not have an easy path to a 24th Grand Slam title, and neither does Iga Swiatek, the defending women’s champion.After a marathon match between Novak Djokovic and Carlos Alcaraz on Sunday in the final of the Western & Southern Open in Ohio, Djokovic said he hoped to play Alcaraz again at the U.S. Open “for the crowd.”The crowd may get to see that rematch.The men’s and women’s singles draws for the U.S. Open, which begins on Monday in New York, revealed the path for Djokovic and Alcaraz to meet again in the final, which would also be a rematch of last month’s Wimbledon final, a thrilling five-setter that Alcaraz won after nearly five hours on the court.“Every match we play against each other goes the distance,” Djokovic said after the final on Sunday, adding that the match felt like a Grand Slam.Djokovic returns to New York after missing the U.S. Open last year because he was unvaccinated against the coronavirus and travel restrictions would not allow him to enter the United States. Now, with an injured Rafael Nadal and a retired Roger Federer not in his way, Djokovic will seek his 24th Grand Slam title and his third of the season after winning in Australia and France earlier this year.Djokovic, who will play Alexandre Muller of France in the first round of the tournament, will not have an easy path to the final. He could potentially face the No. 7 seed Stefanos Tsitsipas of Greece in the quarterfinals, and in the semifinals, Djokovic could play Holger Rune of Denmark or Casper Ruud, the Norwegian who reached last year’s U.S. Open final.Alcaraz, who will face Dominik Koepfer of Germany in the first round, could also see some formidable opposition as he looks to defend his U.S. Open title. Alcaraz could play against Jannik Sinner of Italy in the quarterfinals, followed by one of two Russians, either Andrey Rublev or Daniil Medvedev, the 2021 U.S. Open champion.The women’s draw could also lead to several rivalries and rematches. Iga Swiatek, the No. 1 women’s player in the world, could end up in the final against Aryna Sabalenka, this year’s Australian Open champion.In defending her U.S. Open title, Swiatek could face Coco Gauff in the quarterfinals. Before this month, Swiatek had won seven matches against Gauff, but the 19-year-old American finally found a way to defeat Swiatek this month in the semifinals of the Western & Southern Open. Gauff went on to win the tournament for her first WTA 1000 title.On the other side of the draw, Sabalenka could play a quarterfinal match against Ons Jabeur, the Tunisian No. 5 seed who reached the U.S. Open final last year and lost in the Wimbledon final in July. In the semis, Sabalenka could meet either Caroline Garcia of France or Jessica Pegula, the American No. 3 seed.While both draws offer promising matchups, this year’s tournament will miss some big names: An injury has kept Nadal sidelined since the Australian Open, with hopes to return next year. Naomi Osaka, a two-time U.S. Open champion, will miss the tournament after giving birth to her daughter this summer, and Emma Raducanu, the 2021 U.S. Open champion, is out as she recovers from three minor procedures.Simona Halep, a two-time Grand Slam singles champion, was withdrawn from the tournament because of a provisional suspension she received last year after she tested positive for a performance-enhancing drug during the 2022 U.S. Open.This year’s U.S. Open will also miss trick shots from Nick Kyrgios, who withdrew from the tournament because of a wrist injury.But despite the notable absences, the tournament will open with some strong first-round matches: Tsitsipas, who lost to Djokovic in this year’s Australian Open final, will start off against Milos Raonic, a Wimbledon finalist in 2016. Venus Williams, the 43-year-old seven-time Grand Slam champion, will play Paula Badosa, who won at Indian Wells in 2021. And Sloane Stephens, the 2017 U.S. Open champion, will play in the first round against Beatriz Haddad Maia, a Brazilian player who has had a decent season, reaching the French Open semifinals this year and the round of 16 at Wimbledon. More

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      Ben Shelton Masters a Tricky Fifth Set at the Australian Open. Holger Rune Does Not.

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      Neither Shelton, 20, nor Rune, 19, had gone this deep at the Australian Open. Playing in fourth-round matches on different courts, only one advanced to the quarterfinals.MELBOURNE, Australia — Two young tennis players born just six months apart were in different arenas but in the same predicament on Monday: trying to figure out how to prevail in a fifth set.Neither Holger Rune nor Ben Shelton had been this far at an Australian Open.Shelton, a 20-year-old American lefty with a friendly manner and an unfriendly serve, had never played in the Australian Open at all until this month: not even as a junior.But both powerful and hungry youngsters were on the brink of reaching the quarterfinals on opposite ends of the vast concourse at Melbourne Park that leads from the main court, Rod Laver Arena, to John Cain Arena.Rune, a 19-year-old from Denmark who entered the tournament ranked 10th in the world after a breakthrough 2022 season, was in Laver Arena facing the No. 5 seed Andrey Rublev in one of the featured matches of the day.The unseeded Shelton was somewhere closer to Off Broadway in Cain Arena facing J.J. Wolf, another unseeded American aiming for a breakthrough.Laver Arena was full. Cain Arena was not, with only a few fans seated on its sunny side on a warm yet hardly torrid day.But there were still shouts, roars and plenty of shifts in momentum in both venues before both matches arrived at a decisive fifth set, part of the learning curve for a professional men’s tennis player.Rune and Shelton had each played just one five-setter before arriving in Melbourne. Rune cramped in his five-set defeat to Kwon Soon-woo of South Korea at last year’s Australian Open; Shelton ran out of steam in his five-set defeat to Nuno Borges of Portugal at last year’s U.S. Open, his only previous major tournament.“Five sets in the heat, I barely survived,” Shelton said. “My fitness wasn’t near what I needed it to be at. So, I’ve worked really hard these last five or six months to get to where I want to be.”He has hired Daniel Pohl, the German fitness trainer who has worked with Naomi Osaka. Shelton was smart on Monday: toning down his natural exuberance early against Wolf to save fuel; dominating the fourth-set tiebreaker; jumping out to a quick lead in the fifth set; and then building on it to win, 6-7 (5), 6-2, 6-7 (4), 7-6 (4), 6-2.The 2023 Australian OpenThe year’s first Grand Slam event runs from Jan. 16 to Jan. 29 in Melbourne.Victoria Azarenka’s Deep Run: The Belarusian tennis player has taken a more process-oriented approach than in the past. The outcomes have been good so far.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.Endless Games: As matches stretch into the early-morning hours, players have grown concerned for their health and performance.A New Style Star: Frances Tiafoe may have lost his shot at winning the Australian Open, but his swirly “himbo” look won him fashion points.Wolf, 24, never broke Shelton’s serve in five sets, getting only two break points. Now Shelton will play in another all-American match against Tommy Paul, 25, in the first Grand Slam quarterfinal for both. Paul, already an established threat on the tour with victories over Rafael Nadal and Carlos Alcaraz, advanced with a victory, 6-2, 4-6, 6-2, 7-5, over the No. 24 seed Roberto Bautista Agut of Spain.With Sebastian Korda already in the quarterfinals, there are three American men among the final eight in Australia for the first time since 2000 when Pete Sampras, Andre Agassi and the much lesser-known Chris Woodruff reached that stage.Shelton, who won the 2022 Division I men’s singles championship at the University of Florida and then turned professional that August, has had a fine draw here, facing no opponents ranked in the top 50. His returns need lots of work but after saving a match point in the first round against Zhang Zhizhen of China, he has continued to rise to the occasion, embracing the matches and the post-match interviews with the same enthusiasm.In only his second major tournament, Shelton has gone one round farther than his father and coach, Bryan Shelton, whose best Grand Slam run was to the fourth round at Wimbledon in 1994. He will also pass his father’s best career ranking of 55, breaking into the top 50 next week.“I try not to think about that at all,” Ben Shelton said of the comparison. “My dad’s the reason I’m here. I wouldn’t be here without him. They say you do better on your second try, and I think the way he coaches and explains the game to me and all the life experiences he’s given me, and my mom as well, are pretty much the sole reason I’m in the position I’m in.”Holger Rune after losing to Andrey Rublev in five sets.Martin Keep/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThere is a gentle side to Shelton, much gentler than his running forehand, while Rune stalks the court with his long, elastic strides like a predator in search of the next meal.Still a teenager, Rune is already an imposing, intimidating physical presence, with rippling muscles in his legs and nervous energy as he adjusts his backward ball cap, picks at his shirt and shifts his weight as he prepares for the next rally.“I have so much passion to play matches, to compete,” he said. “To play tennis in this event is what I’ve been dreaming about since I was a little kid, so I’m leaving it all out there.”That approach worked in November when he swept through the field at the Paris Maters indoor event, beating Novak Djokovic in the final. And it looked like it would do the job again Monday when he served for the match at 5-3 in the fifth set against Rublev, the combustible shaggy-haired Russian who seems to throw his lean frame, and a percussive grunt, into each shot with every fiber of his being.In all, Rublev reeled off eight consecutive points before Rune held serve to 6-5 and then earned himself two match points in the next game.Rublev saved the first with a wide serve that Rune could not handle and the second with a crosscourt forehand that Rune could not handle.Andrey Rublev reeled Holger Rune in with great serves and one bold forehand that landed on the outer edge of a sideline.Martin Keep/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesHe made it into the tiebreaker, only to see Rune jump out to a 5-0 lead. On other occasions, Rublev might have lost the plot, shouting at the injustice of it all, breaking rackets or pounding himself on the side of the head. But he kept it comparatively together this time, and he had time to recover because all the majors use a first-to-10-point final-set tiebreaker.Rublev slowly reeled Rune in with great serves and one bold forehand that landed on the outer edge of a sideline that left Rune wincing.Rublev soon led, 9-7, with two match points. Though Rune saved the first with a first serve, he had to produce something more extraordinary on the second: a running backhand pass winner down the line after Rublev chose not to hit to the open court with a swing volley.It was 9 all, and it was loud, very loud, with Rublev biting on his shirt collar and Rune pointing to his ears to ask for even more volume from the fans. Instead, he got an unlucky bounce.On Rublev’s next match point at 10-9 he hit a backhand return off Rune’s second serve that smacked into the net cord. Rublev was sure the ball was going to fall back on his side of the net. Instead, it trickled over and bounced on Rune’s side for a match-ending winner.“The luckiest probably moment of my life,” Rublev said. “Now I can go casino. If I put for sure I’m going to win.”Both men dropped their rackets, and Rublev dropped to the ground. He rose with tears in his eyes to embrace the youngster whose time, one expects, will come given all the tools already at his disposal.But potential is one thing, converting it another, and it may not be easy for Rune to shake off such a defeat. The image from Monday that will stick with observers was Rublev celebrating with both arms raised and Rune slumped in a chair behind him, both hands covering his face.“Of course, it’s not the end of the world, but it hurts,” Rune said. “I have to look at the other side, that there’s a few things I could have done better, so when I’m playing the next Grand Slam this won’t happen again hopefully.”Rublev, 0-6 in Grand Slam quarterfinals, gets to keep playing in this tournament, though perhaps not for long considering that he will next face Djokovic, a nine-time Australian Open champion who looked like a man back on a mission (and a healthy hamstring) on Monday as he demolished the Australian Alex de Minaur, 6-2, 6-1, 6-2.“The only chance I have is if I play my best tennis,” Rublev said.That sounds about right. More

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      Alcaraz Beats Sinner in Late, Late US Open Match

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      The Spanish teenager needed five sets and more than five hours to reach the semifinals in a match that ended shortly before 3 a.m. in New York.It was the latest finish ever at the U.S. Open, played in a city that purportedly never sleeps, but Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner made it well worth staying up into the wee hours.In one of the best (and longest) matches ever contested at this Grand Slam tournament in New York, Alcaraz, a 19-year-old Spanish prodigy, fought off a match point in the fourth set to defeat Sinner, a 21-year-old Italian prodigy, 6-3, 6-7 (7), 6-7 (0), 7-5, 6-3, to advance to the semifinals.“I always say you have to believe in yourself all the time, and that hope is the last thing you lose,” Alcaraz said in an on-court interview early Thursday morning. “I just believed in myself and believed in my game.”The match, an instant-classic quarterfinal, lasted 5 hours and 15 minutes, the second longest Open match ever, and finished at 2:50 a.m., 24 minutes later than the previous record shared by three matches.The suspense and tension was that constant, the quality of the shotmaking and the effort that transcendent.Alcaraz, seeded third, and Sinner, seeded 11th, have long been considered the future of tennis, but they looked much more like the present after the match started on Wednesday night, setting a torrid pace from the baseline and chasing down each other’s drop shots and would-be winners.Alcaraz, an acrobatic speedster from Murcia, Spain, will face Frances Tiafoe of the United States on Friday.Hiroko Masuike/The New York TimesBut only Alcaraz, an acrobatic speedster from Murcia, will have a chance to make his big breakthrough at this unusually wide-open tournament. He will face Frances Tiafoe of the United States on Friday in what will be the first Grand Slam semifinal for both men. In the other semifinal, Casper Ruud of Norway will face Karen Khachanov of Russia.None of those four men have won a major singles title: no dishonor and no surprise in a long-running era that has been dominated by the Big 3 of Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic.But neither Federer nor Djokovic played this year in New York, and Nadal, short on matches and perhaps even a little short on inspiration after a taxing season, was upset in the fourth round by Tiafoe, a flashy 24-year-old who is the first American man since Andy Roddick in 2006 to advance this far at his home Grand Slam event.Tiafoe will surely have the majority of the support in Arthur Ashe Stadium, with its capacity of nearly 24,000. He will also have the advantage of extra rest.His three-set match with Andrey Rublev was played in the day session, which allowed Tiafoe to settle in for the evening at his hotel as Alcaraz and Sinner pushed each other historically deep into the night.The match was the second longest ever played at the U.S. Open, behind only the 1992 semifinal between Stefan Edberg and Michael Chang, won by Edberg in 5 hours and 26 minutes.But Alcaraz, who fell onto his back and dropped to the court after closing out the match with a service winner, looked anything but pessimistic as he tapped his chest and thanked the few thousand fans who stayed until the finish.The digital clock on the court showed that it was just about 3 a.m., but it wasn’t too early to look ahead to his next match.“It’s going to be really, really tough,” Alcaraz said at a news conference that finished shortly before 4 a.m. “Everybody knows the level of Frances. He has beaten Rafa Nadal; Rublev in three sets. He’s playing unbelievable right now: high confidence. He loves the crowd. He loves this court.”Despite Alcaraz’s youth, this is becoming a habit. His previous match against Marin Cilic — another five-set duel — also concluded after 2 a.m., and the late-night finishes will almost certainly revive the debate about the wisdom of putting athletes of any age in this position.The U.S. Open is not alone: The Australian Open, the first major of the season, has had even later finishes. But with a night session that begins at 7 p.m. (or later) and typically includes a best-of-three-set women’s match and a best-of-five-set men’s match, there is always a risk of sleep deprivation.Changing the start times or programming could address the situation, but it must be balanced with the strong emphasis on giving the men and women equal billing on the main show court. Night sessions are also an important source of revenue for the majors and many other tour events (the French Open recently added one as well in 2021).But Alcaraz, who is in the middle of a breakthrough season, has already demonstrated that he can recover from one nocturnal marathon. Now he will get a second opportunity. He is the youngest man to reach the semifinals of the U.S. Open since Pete Sampras, an American who was 19 in 1990 when he went on to win the title.Alcaraz grew up playing almost exclusively on clay in Murcia, in southeastern Spain, at a local club developed by his grandfather. But in recent years, he has begun training much more often on hardcourts at the JC Ferrero Equelite Sport Academy in Villena, about 60 miles away, where Alcaraz boards and works with his coach, Juan Carlos Ferrero, a former world No. 1 for whom the academy is named.Though Alcaraz beat Nadal and Djokovic to win the Masters 1000 title on clay in Madrid this year, and reached the quarterfinals of the French Open, his best results so far in his short career have come on hardcourts. He reached the quarterfinals last year in his debut U.S. Open and reached the semifinal of the BNP Paribas Open in March before winning the Miami Open.Alcaraz is the youngest man to reach the semifinals of the U.S. Open since Pete Sampras, who was 19 in 1990 when he went on to win the title.When Jannik Sinner served for the match at 5-4, he could not seal the deal.Hiroko Masuike/The New York TimesHe has an all-action style, and he frequently slides into near splits even on a hardcourt, a surface that allows him to make fast changes in direction and get the full benefit of his quickness.Sinner, who defeated Alcaraz in July in the fourth round at Wimbledon, repeatedly had to hit three or four terrific shots close to the lines to secure points as Alcaraz stretched and skidded to retrieve balls that would have escaped the reach of lesser talents.Sinner is not as quick, not as much of a showman, but he has his own enviable strengths, including an ability to produce smooth, seemingly effortless power and precision by punching and counterpunching near or inside the baseline.Both young men squandered opportunities that could have made their night easier (and shorter), but that was due, in part, to the resilience and skills of the opposition.When Sinner served for the match at 5-4, he could not seal the deal, failing to convert his lone match point at 40-30 when he missed a backhand off a strong second-serve return. Sinner then missed a forehand swing volley just wide to allow Alcaraz to even the score at 5-5.Alcaraz swept through the next two games to force a fifth set, which began at 2:05 a.m. after four and a half hours of toe-to-toe tennis.And yet the level did not drop, as both men continued hustling to all corners of the court and making magic on the move.“I was ready for a tough, tough battle,” Sinner said. “I feel physically for sure more ready to play these kind of matches for hours and hours.”Despite the next-generation masterwork that was on display early into Thursday morning, there is no guarantee in elite sports, certainly not in tennis, that the promise will be fully realized over the long run.For an example, Alcaraz and Sinner needed to look no further than one of the spectators at Ashe Stadium: Juan Martin del Potro, the 2009 U.S. Open men’s champion.A towering Argentine with thunderous strokes, he looked likely to take his place alongside the Big 3, only to see his career interrupted and ultimately ended by major wrist and knee injuries.Alcaraz is in the middle of a breakthrough season.Hiroko Masuike/The New York TimesThe lesson is clear: Seize the championship opportunities when they arise, regardless of your age or your upside.And though both Alcaraz and Sinner had this marvelous match in their grasp as Wednesday night turned into Thursday, only Alcaraz got to experience the mixture of euphoria and relief that comes with this kind of special victory.“I think this one will hurt for quite a while,” said Sinner in his very-late-night news conference.Alcaraz can still win the U.S. Open, but first he had better get some sleep. 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      Frances Tiafoe Reaches US Open Semifinals With Win Over Rublev

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      Tiafoe backed up a win over Rafael Nadal with a quarterfinal victory over Andrey Rublev, 7-6 (3), 7-6 (0), 6-4.There are so many different kinds of pressure that tennis players can exert on their opponents over the course of a match.Blasting massive serve after massive serve. Hitting deep. Hounding the baseline to push the opponent into the back of the court. Rushing the net and standing tall there, unafraid, just 35 feet away. There is even the pressure of the scoreboard that comes with early leads in games, or of the softest drop shots that can land like uppercuts to the gut.An ability to get a crowd of more than 20,000 to raise the decibel count to uncomfortable levels at the crucial moments also helps.Frances Tiafoe, who used all those skills and more in his tight three-set win over Andrey Rublev of Russia on Wednesday, has another tool, too. On hot, sweaty afternoons, when he changes his shirt, he sits bare-chested in his chair for a good bit, the muscles rippling across his back, showing off a physique more befitting a mixed martial arts octagon than a tennis court.To beat him, opponents have to get through that, which can stick in the mind during those critical tests of nerve known as tiebreakers. Tiafoe won, 7-6 (3), 7-6 (0), 6-4, in a match that was so even for so long, except when Tiafoe surged during the tiebreakers, as he has done for 10 days. He has played six tiebreakers in this tournament and has won them all, including a 7-0 gem against Rublev in the second set Wednesday.“Best tiebreaker I will ever play,” Tiafoe said after the match. “Ridiculous.”No American man has won the U.S. Open or any Grand Slam singles title since 2003, when Andy Roddick, who was on hand Wednesday to watch Tiafoe, lifted the trophy in New York. (The N.B.A. star Bradley Beal, a Tiafoe fan and friend who plays for his beloved Washington Wizards, was there, too.)Hiroko Masuike/The New York TimesMichelle V. Agins/The New York TimesSam Querrey, a big-serving Californian, plowed into the Wimbledon semifinals in 2017 and John Isner got there in 2018. But even then, those moments felt like the ceilings they turned out to be.This is different. At 24, Tiafoe beat Rafael Nadal on Sunday in a ground-shifting upset that made him the first American born after 1989 to beat Nadal, Novak Djokovic or Roger Federer in a Grand Slam tournament. The win made him the youngest American to reach the quarterfinals of the U.S. Open in 16 years.He is fast and fearless, and serves at more than 130 miles per hour in game after game. He is suddenly steady after years of being prone to peaks and valleys in the middle of sets and matches. His hands have always been quick; now they are just as soft as well and able to create the calmest drop volleys off the most furious forehands.And with one last blasted ace, he became a U.S. Open semifinalist, and a figure of hope in a country that has watched its female players perform on the biggest stages in the biggest matches during the last decade and wondered when a man might come along and be able to do the same.Tiafoe will play the winner of Wednesday night’s match between Carlos Alcaraz, the 19-year-old Spanish prodigy who will become the world’s top-ranked player if he wins this tournament, and Jannik Sinner, a 21-year-old Italian seeded 11th.“I hope they play a marathon match,” Tiafoe joked.Many in the game see Sinner vs. Alcaraz as a potential sequel to the Federer-Nadal-Djokovic rivalries that have dominated the men’s game for more than 15 years. Tiafoe would love to play a major role in whatever grand narratives the sport crafts during the next decade.Three years ago at the Australian Open, the only other time he made a Grand Slam quarterfinal, that looked like it might be a possibility. But Tiafoe slumped after that breakthrough, falling out the top 80 in the world rankings.Friends and family in Tiafoe’s box cheering him on.Michelle V. Agins/The New York TimesThen, starting roughly two years ago with the 2020 U.S. Open, a tournament played near the height of the pandemic with no spectators, Tiafoe began a steady climb back into the top 30, and lately had been trying to catch up with the other top Americans around his age, a clique including Taylor Fritz, Reilly Opelka and Tommy Paul with whom he grew up. Sometimes, it’s not speed that matters most, but direction.“Some players have difficulty being really, really talented and not playing the game the way you need to do,” said Wayne Ferreira, a top professional in the 1980s and 1990s who has coached Tiafoe the past two years. “The food intake was terrible and the effort in the practicing and the court wasn’t good enough.”Tiafoe was plenty good enough Wednesday, capping off, for now, a remarkable five days during which he has become the buzz of a tournament that has not lacked for it since the first ball rose into the air.First the fans came for Serena Williams at this U.S. Open to see the 23-time Grand Slam singles champion make one last run. Then they came for Coco Gauff, the 18-year-old heir apparent to Williams. And on Wednesday, they came to Arthur Ashe Stadium for Tiafoe.Many of them may have had little idea of who the no-longer-really-a-kid from Hyattsville, Md., was when the tournament started. Now they surely know him, the child of immigrants from Sierra Leone, who started playing tennis because his father was a janitor at a local tennis club.During matches, his player bench is a complete mess, with rackets and towels everywhere.“Diabolical,” is how he described it. His hotel room is that way, too, he said.He has an innate love for bright lights and know-how for playing before screaming throngs, and a game that is fast becoming as varied and creative as it is an exercise both in pressure of power and the power of pressure. That pressure had Rublev, a gentle soul who burns hot on a tennis court, kicking at balls in the final moments of the two-hour, 36-minute battle.Rublev had played Tiafoe nearly to a draw during the first 100 minutes. Then came the second-set tiebreaker, and Tiafoe played seven of the best points of his career, bullying Rublev to submission.Hiroko Masuike/The New York TimesHe smashed service returns back at Rublev’s feet, feathered two lusty drop volleys, smashed two aces and finished off the sweep with a searing backhand winner he punctuated with what is becoming his signature celebration — a sprint back to his courtside chair.Rublev, seeded ninth, kept fighting hard but was largely finished with Tiafoe in peak form. He cracked for good while serving seven games later, whipping an easy forehand, usually one of the best in the game, into the middle of the net to give Tiafoe a shot to break his serve, then sending a backhand in the middle of the court long with Tiafoe standing at the net just a few feet away.He will be back there Friday, trying to exert all forms of pressure once more. More

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      Medvedev Seizes Chance to Make an Impression on French Open Fans

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      Daniil Medvedev and other Russians, barred from competing at Wimbledon because of the war in Ukraine, have made a run in the French Open. The ban remains a sensitive issue in tennis.PARIS — Banned from Wimbledon, the Russians seem intent on making the most of the Grand Slam tournament at hand.One by one, they took to the red clay at the French Open on Saturday, and one by one, they emerged victorious.Daria Kasatkina and Veronika Kudermetova advanced to the fourth round in women’s singles. Andrey Rublev and Daniil Medvedev did the same in men’s singles, joining their compatriot Karen Khachanov, who was already set to face Carlos Alcaraz, the Spanish teen sensation, on Sunday.Medvedev remains the most intriguing Russian at Roland Garros on multiple levels. As the No. 2 seed, he is on relatively dry land for the moment: on the opposite half of the draw from Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Alcaraz.He was once seemingly allergic to clay, at least the French Open, losing in the first round in his first four appearances. He still has a losing record on the surface, but he made a French Open quarterfinal run last year, and after hernia surgery in March that caused him to miss most of the clay-court season, he arrived in Paris seemingly fresh in body and mind. On court, he has rumbled past three solid players in straight sets, including the No. 28 seed Miomir Kecmanovic on Saturday: 6-2, 6-4, 6-2.Medvedev did not lose his serve and seemed to be one step or slide ahead of Kecmanovic from start to finish, absorbing pace, producing power and precision on demand, and using his big wingspan at 6-foot-6 to close down the openings.“Today was truly magnificent,” Medvedev said in the sunshine as he gave his post-match interview on Suzanne Lenglen Court. “It was all working for me. There are days like that, and I hope more like that will be possible in the days ahead.”Medvedev was conducting the interview in fluent French. He has been based on the French Riviera since his teens, and with his droll sense of humor and language skills he is able to connect with the Parisian public on a level that is unusual for a foreign tennis player (as long as he continues to avoid berating chair umpires or breaking rackets in a fit of pique).The global repercussions of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have included a sensitive dilemma for tennis, prompted by Wimbledon’s decision to bar Russian and Belarusian players from the tournament next month. The men’s and women’s tours responded by stripping Wimbledon of its ranking points, saying the move was needed to protect its systems that in part determine tournament qualifications.It is, as Djokovic described it, “a lose-lose” situation: full of hard choices and restless nights for those making the calls.But Medvedev, caught in the maelstrom, hardly seemed a pariah on Saturday as he cracked jokes with the interviewer Marion Bartoli, a former French star and Wimbledon champion.“He speaks French as well as we do, like someone born in France even if he was born in Moscow,” she said. “He understands what is going on, understands his environment, and it’s clear that it pleases the public here a great deal that he communicates in their language.”Some of that is due to communicating for years in French with his longtime French coach, Gilles Cervara.“Gilles is sometimes trying to use words on purpose that I don’t know, that I should know, that are uncommon,” Medvedev said. “It’s the same thing with tennis, where you’re trying to do things that are out of the ordinary to shake things up and do something extra. You have to always improve.”I asked Medvedev later what it would take for him to be considered “a dirtballer.”His reaction: “What is ‘dirtballer’?”Apprised that it meant clay-courter, he smiled and said: “I’ll have to do better than last year in Roland Garros. That’s for sure.”Like many a Muscovite, including Rublev, Medvedev grew up playing much of the year in fast indoor conditions.“It was not even hardcourts — it was more like indoor ice,” Rublev said with a laugh on Saturday. “You touch the ball and the ball is like a rocket. You hit one ball and the ball is going so fast, even when you are 6 years old. In Moscow, there is actually plenty of clay, but the problem is there’s not much summer, only two or three months, so you don’t get much time to play on it.”Rublev, the No. 7 seed and long based in Spain, has had more consistent results on clay at the pro level and was a quarterfinalist at the French Open in 2020 and a finalist at the Monte Carlo Open last year. His forehand, hit with heavy topspin and major racket-head speed, fits the traditional vision of a clay-courter much more than Medvedev’s with his comparatively flat strokes.But it is very tempting to agree with Rublev that Medvedev’s biggest obstacle on clay is between the ears.“He didn’t beat Djokovic in Monte Carlo for nothing,” Rublev said in an interview, recalling a 2019 upset. “So, I think it’s more about him, that he put this in his head, than it is about the clay. And we can all see now that he has won all the matches here quite easy, beating good players.”Still, the path does not get smoother. Medvedev is in a more welcoming neighborhood than the top half of the draw, but it is still a rough neighborhood with Rublev, Jannik Sinner, Stefanos Tsitsipas, Hubert Hurkacz and Casper Ruud all on the prowl.Next up for Medvedev: the No. 20 seed Marin Cilic, who overwhelmed a weary Gilles Simon, 6-0, 6-3, 6-2, on Saturday in the 37-year-old Simon’s final French Open match (he will retire at year’s end). Simon, one of the cleanest hitters and deeper thinkers on tour, gave an excellent summary of why it will soon be time to bid adieu.“It’s a lot of work and a lot of suffering,” Simon said. “I am at three anti-inflammatories and six paracetamols before the match. The only thing left to try is morphine. I know where I’m at. I’ll give it my all until the end of the year.”Medvedev sounded world-weary himself after losing the Australian Open final to Nadal in January with the crowd against him. He looked tired and irritable in March as he lost early in Indian Wells to Gael Monfils and in the quarterfinals in Miami to Hurkacz before undergoing surgery.Even his successes have been tempered of late. When he rose to No. 1 for the first time on Feb. 28, his breakthrough came as Russia invaded Ukraine, rightly darkening the mood. He stayed on top for only three weeks before Djokovic reclaimed the spot. But the tours’ decision to strip the points from Wimbledon, where Djokovic won the title last year, means that Medvedev is in prime position to return to No. 1 in the coming weeks.Barring a highly unlikely compromise, he will be watching Wimbledon from afar, but for now at least, he is in the Grand Slam arena, in no mood to talk politics but increasingly eager to speak in French and about clay.“I hope the better I speak French, the better I will play,” he said on court, the Roland Garros crowd already “dans la poche” (in the pocket), even if the champions trophy is not. More

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      Wimbledon Will Bar Russian and Belarusian Players

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      Wimbledon officials have confirmed that they intend to bar Russian and Belarusian players from playing in this year’s tournament because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Belarus’s support of the war.The ban would make Wimbledon the first Grand Slam tennis event to restrict individual Russian and Belarusian athletes from competing. In a statement Wednesday afternoon, Wimbledon confirmed that other tennis tournaments to be held this year in the United Kingdom plan to take the same approach.“Given the profile of The Championships in the United Kingdom and around the world, it is our responsibility to play our part in the widespread efforts of government, industry, sporting and creative institutions to limit Russia’s global influence through the strongest means possible,” the statement read.“In the circumstances of such unjustified and unprecedented military aggression, it would be unacceptable for the Russian regime to derive any benefits from the involvement of Russian or Belarusian players with The Championships.”Wimbledon, one of the four Grand Slam tournaments, is scheduled to begin in late June. The tournament, in its statement, left open the possibility of revising its position, stating that “if circumstances change materially between now and June, we will consider and respond accordingly.”The decision would exclude a number of highly ranked players. Four Russian men are ranked in the top 30 on the ATP Tour, including No. 2 Daniil Medvedev, who is the reigning U.S. Open men’s singles champion, although he is recovering from a hernia operation. Russia has five women in the top 40 of the WTA Tour rankings, led by No. 15 Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova. Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus is ranked No. 4 and was a Wimbledon semifinalist last year. Her compatriot Victoria Azarenka, a former No. 1, is ranked No. 18.After the war began in February, professional tennis organizers were quick to bar the Russians and their Belarusian allies from team events like the Davis Cup and the Billie Jean King Cup, both of which were won by Russian teams in 2021. The sport’s seven governing bodies announced that ban collectively on March 1.And the men’s and women’s tour events in Moscow later this season were canceled, as were a number of lower-tier events in Russia and Belarus. The International Tennis Federation also announced the suspension of the Russian Tennis Federation and Belarusian Tennis Federation from I.T.F. membership.But Russian and Belarusian players have been permitted to continue competing on the professional tours as individuals albeit without any national identification. There are no longer flags or countries listed next to their names on scoreboards, in draws or in the published computer rankings.Russia’s Daniil Medvedev during the 2021 Wimbledon tournament. He is currently ranked No. 2 in men’s singles.Adrian Dennis/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesBut there have been calls for a full ban from several former and current Ukrainian players, including the rising women’s star Marta Kostyuk and the former player Olga Savchuk, the captain of Ukraine’s Billie Jean King Cup team, which competed against the United States in Asheville, N.C., last week.“I think it’s just a matter of time,” Savchuk said in an interview. “It’s not me who’s making the decision, but I think they should also be banned from playing as individuals. It cannot just be a sanction against 90 percent of the Russian people and 10 percent not.”“It has to be even,” Savchuk added. “And I think it’s collective guilt.”But while some other international sports, including track and field and figure skating, have barred individual Russian and Belarusian athletes from some competitions, professional tennis had adopted a more conservative approach.Russia-Ukraine War: Key DevelopmentsCard 1 of 3A new phase of the war. More

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      Tennis Suspends Russia and Belarus but Will Allow Their Players to Compete

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      The move will allow stars like Daniil Medvedev of Russia and Victoria Azarenka of Belarus to participate in tournaments but as neutral players with no national identification.The organizations that oversee professional tennis will prohibit Russia and Belarus from competing in team events but will allow players from those countries to participate in tournaments without any national identification.The announcement on Tuesday came one day after the International Olympic Committee recommended that sports organizations bar Russian and Belarusian athletes from events. Other groups, including FIFA, soccer’s international governing body, have also imposed penalties following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a deployment that has been assisted by Belarus.“The International Tennis Federation condemns Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its facilitation by Belarus,” a statement said. “In addition to the cancellation of all I.T.F. events in those countries, the I.T.F. Board has today announced the immediate suspension of the Russian Tennis Federation and Belarus Tennis Federation from I.T.F. membership and from participation in I.T.F. international team competition until further notice. The I.T.F. remains in close contact with the Ukraine Tennis Federation and stands in solidarity with the people of Ukraine.”In a joint statement from all the governing bodies for the sport, organizers said the events of the past week had caused “distress, shock and sadness.”“We commend the many tennis players who have spoken out and taken action against this unacceptable act of aggression,” the statement continued. “We echo their calls for the violence to end and peace to return.”The men’s and women’s professional tours also suspended a tournament scheduled for Moscow in October.Enforcing penalties on countries is a complicated issue for tennis, especially because seven organizations oversee the sport and its major events. For much of the year, players operate as independent contractors who compete for themselves rather than their countries. Most have only limited interaction with the national federations that run tennis in their homelands and work with private coaches and managers.The initial announcement Tuesday from the I.T.F. amounted to an attempt to separate players born in Russia and Belarus from their nations, a move that Elina Svitolina, Ukraine’s top-ranked professional, had urged her sport to pursue.Svitolina, the top seed this week in a tournament in Mexico, on Monday announced that she would not play her first-round match against Anastasia Potapova of Russia unless Russian and Belarusian players competed only as neutral athletes.In a Twitter post, Svitolina said that her fellow tennis players were not to blame for the Russian invasion, but that the world had to send a message to Russia through every possible channel.In recent years, Russia has become the world’s leading tennis nation. It won the major national team tournaments for both the men and the women last year. Belarus is the home of the third-ranked women’s player, Aryna Sabalenka, and to 16th-ranked Victoria Azarenka.The I.O.C.’s recommendation came on the same day that Daniil Medvedev of Russia took over the No. 1 ranking on the ATP Tour, which oversees the men’s professional game.Medvedev is the first player who is not a member of the game’s so-called Big Four — Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray — to become the world No. 1 since 2004. Also on Monday, Andrey Rublev, another top Russian player, rose to No. 6.Russia-Ukraine War: Key Things to KnowCard 1 of 4Civilians under fire. More

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      The U.S. Open Is Alex Molcan’s Proving Ground

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      After seeing one of his junior opponents soar in the rankings while he floundered, Molcan has regained confidence and is in the third round of his first Grand Slam event.Alex Molcan had usually played Andrey Rublev evenly when they competed in junior tournaments for players age 14 and under. Sometimes Rublev won, sometimes it was Molcan.But as they got older, their paths began to diverge.Rublev, now ranked No. 7 in men’s singles, began making big strides, winning tournaments and reaching the quarterfinals of the U.S. Open in 2017 at just age 19.Molcan, meanwhile, was stagnating back in Bratislava, Slovakia, where he lived at the time. Molcan began to ask himself why.“How is it possible that he’s there and I’m here?” Molcan said in an interview on Wednesday. “And then I realized that I screwed up.”That realization several years ago may have saved Molcan’s tennis career, and although it took several years to make up for it, he is now moving in the right direction again. He started the year ranked No. 313 but is now at 138th and headed higher after he won three tough matches to qualify for the U.S. Open, and then pulled off a pair of upsets to advance to the third round in the main draw.Playing in the main draw of a Grand Slam event for the first time at age 23, the left-handed Molcan will play No. 11 Diego Schwartzman of Argentina on Friday in a matchup that seemed unlikely when the draw was released.“I believe in my game, now,” Molcan said. “Finally, I started to believe that what I’m doing is right.”Until this week, the highlight of Molcan’s career was reaching the final of the Belgrade 2 tournament, where he faced top-ranked Novak Djokovic on May 29. Molcan, who had beaten Fernando Verdasco and No. 52 Federico Delbonis to reach the final, broke Djokovic’s serve in the first game with a forehand down the line, and said to himself, “I can play with these guys.”No one was shocked when Djokovic came back to win in straight sets, but Molcan came away brimming with confidence, especially with the help of a mental strength coach he said has been instrumental to his recent success.Originally from Presov, a town of about 90,000 in eastern in Slovakia, Molcan showed enough promise as a child that his mother, who was divorced from his father, took him and his little sister 250 miles west to Bratislava when Alex was 12. If he was going to make it as a pro, Bratislava was the place to train.After a few years his mother, Andrea Jackova, moved back to Presov for work. Molcan stayed in Bratislava, living with a friend’s family. Molcan said the family traveled quite a bit and left the two boys, then 14 and 15, home alone, and not surprisingly, trouble ensued as the two adolescents began drinking and running around at will.“Two young guys in Bratislava, it wasn’t good, of course,” Molcan said. “We did stupid things and I wasted two years maybe. The other guys were out there working hard every day and I wasn’t. That kept me down.”But even through his rebellious adolescent haze, Molcan knew deep down he had the ability to beat good players, like Rublev, if he could only rediscover it. He needed to get his focus back. He needed his mother.Jackova, a former sprinter, Molcan said, finally moved back to Bratislava along with Molcan’s sister. She found work as an athletic trainer, but finances were still a challenge and Molcan remembers those difficult days as “crazy times.”“She changed her life because of me,” he said. “It’s what maybe mothers do. Maybe not. But mine did, and to be honest, this is really overwhelming for me that someone can do this for her kids.“To move the family with a little kid, my sister, who was 3 years old, it was the hardest decision in her life because she was trying to help me be a good tennis player, to stay humble and be the good person. It is really amazing.”As a way to show his appreciation, Molcan inscribed his mother’s birthday on a tattoo when he turned 18. With Jackova’s support, Molcan rededicated himself to tennis. But he had lost two critical years of his tennis growth and it would take years to recover. Most of his professional life until this year was spent on the Challenger circuit — tennis’s minor leagues — battling other low-ranked players across Europe for scraps.Molcan lost the final of the Belgrade 2 tournament to Novak Djokovic in May but left the match feeling more confident.Andrej Cukic/EPA, via ShutterstockHis ranking never rose above 250 until this year, when he won spots in his first ATP main tour events. He also earned a chance to qualify for Wimbledon, reaching the final stage of qualifying before losing to Antoine Hoang of France in a five-set match.Molcan then arrived at the U.S. Open needing to win three matches to qualify for his first major tournament. The first two went smoothly, but against Gastao Elias of Portugal, Molcan needed to fight off a match point and then win a tiebreaker, 8-6, in the third and final set. On the final point he dropped his racket, fell onto his back with his arms and legs spread wide, in a brief moment of celebration.His celebrations after his first two main draw wins over Cem Ilkel of Turkey and Brandon Nakashima of the United States were more muted, less emotional, in part because they were not as demanding. He beat Ilkel in four sets and came back from a two-sets-to-one deficit to oust Nakashima on Court 12, with a small crowd rooting hard for the American.Although he had never played five-set matches before this year, Molcan says he has the physical capacity to handle them. He even considers it an asset.“I am prepared,” he said. “I have no worries to play longer matches. That’s where I get the confidence.”If he can somehow outlast Schwartzman, a two-time quarterfinalist at the U.S. Open, and then win two more matches, he could conceivably meet the fifth-seeded Rublev in a semifinal. Then he could really see if, after all these years, he has really caught back up. 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