As his last, desperate backhand soared far past the baseline inside Arthur Ashe Stadium, Taylor Fritz instantly held his face in his hands, unable to hide the agony of squandering such a great opportunity.
For much of his afternoon, Fritz was cruising. He had established two sets to love lead against Francisco Cerundolo before breaking serve in the opening game of the third. One unfocused service game was enough to shift the momentum and once Fritz had lost control, he spent another two hours failing to retrieve it. His US Open ended with an excruciating 3-6, 4-6, 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 third-round defeat by a courageous Cerundolo.
Any early loss at a home grand slam is incredibly difficult to accept, but Fritz’s timing was fatal. Having been ranked as high as No 4 last year, he is the most successful American male player of his generation. In 2024, Fritz became the first American man to reach the US Open singles final since Andy Roddick in 2006, a breakthrough run sandwiched between two quarter-final losses to Novak Djokovic in 2023 and 2025. The 28-year-old is a tremendously committed and diligent competitor who, despite his own athletic shortcomings, has eked so much out of his game. There has always been a far superior tennis player, usually an all-time great, standing before him and the major titles.
This year’s US Open, however, presents a completely different challenge for most of the men’s field. Jannik Sinner, the world No 1 and four-time grand slam champion, is absent due to injury and the now 39-year-old Novak Djokovic was dramatically defeated in the first round. Carlos Alcaraz, the seven-time grand slam champion and defending champion, is competing his first tournament back from a four month injury layoff.
In the absence of an obvious favourite in obvious grand slam-winning form, this tournament is such a great opportunity for any player with aspirations of winning a grand slam title. Fritz, who was high up on the list of names hoping to take advantage, was understandably disgusted with the way he let this opportunity slip. In the deciding set he had three break points for a 5-3 lead and the chance to serve for the match.
“I don’t even know what to say,” he said. “I don’t really want to talk to anybody, see anybody. I kind of just need to get out for a couple days and then just get back to work. I don’t know how I let that happen today.”
At the beginning of the day, seven American men remained in the singles draw: Ben Shelton, Fritz, Frances Tiafoe, Learner Tien, Tommy Paul, Alex Michelsen and Michael Zheng. In the bottom half of the draw, where the fourth-round berths were decided on Friday, there is an American man in each of the four matches. Fritz’s defeat is a warning to any of his compatriots with hopes of becoming the first American man since Roddick at the 2003 US Open to win a grand slam title. More opportunity means more pressure. The coming week will reveal so much about the character of every player in the men’s draw.
Saturday proved a challenging day for American players as a whole. Two days after Madison Keys completed one of the more dramatic comeback victories of her career, saving five match points en route to her tight three-set win over Anna Bondar, she suffered one of her worst ever collapses. Keys led Zheng Qinwen 5-0 in the final set of their third-round match before collapsing in the final set as she lost 1-6, 7-6 (3), 7-5. “I think she started playing better; I started playing poorly,” Keys said. “Then I felt like I couldn’t play tennis any more, and it just was – it just felt like it was a much bigger deal than just playing a tennis match all of a sudden.”
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Keys, the 2025 Australian Open champion, said she believes a result like this had been coming for some time and will force her to address certain issues she has been dealing with. “I just feel like I’ve been struggling for a while now and I feel like I was able to kind of play through it for a bit,” she said. “I’m sure everyone could kind of see that I was struggling a little bit, but inside it felt probably even bigger than that. Some weeks are easier than others, and this week is obviously one of the harder ones just because you care so much. Yeah, I’m going to have to make some changes.”
For Zheng, however, this was an enormous win. Having won the Olympic gold medal and reached the top 10 in 2024, the Chinese player has fallen down the rankings since her return from elbow surgery and the 23-year-old was forced to come through qualifying here just to compete in the main draw.
“Tennis sometimes feels like a rollercoaster,” Zheng said. “You see many times that people have a match point, but at the end [their opponent] makes a comeback. Like today was just happening. So this also gives me a lesson that in a tennis match you always have to be there. It doesn’t matter if you are winning or losing, you have a match point or you don’t have a match point – you just need to be concentrated for every single point as long as you can.”
Amanda Anisimova, whose incredible breakthrough summer of 2025 included runners-up finishes at Wimbledon and the US Open alongside a career-high ranking of No 3, will fall out of the top 10 after tamely losing 6-2, 7-5 to the 24th seed Anastasia Potapova. Iga Swiatek, meanwhile, brilliantly saved three set points in her second set before working her way to a tough 7-6 (3), 7-6 (3) win over Marie Bouzkova. Swiatek faces Zheng in the fourth round on Sunday.
