NEW YORK (AP) — The new U.S. Open mixed doubles tournament drew plenty of criticism for everything from its format to its field.
With mostly singles players, some who rarely play doubles at all, it felt less like a Grand Slam championship than an exhibition — which is what one player referred to it as Tuesday.
The fast-pace event, with shorter matches and a smaller field, already has two teams halfway to a trophy — and a $1 million prize. Whoever wins won't apologize for the way they got it.
“This is the
official mixed doubles. If we get to the final tomorrow, I’m sure everyone is going to be pretty determined to try to win this thing,” Casper Ruud said.
Ruud and Iga Swiatek, the No. 3 seeds, easily won their two matches to advance to Wednesday's semis. So did defending champions Sara Errani and Andrea Vavassori, the only traditional mixed doubles team in the 16-team field.
Past U.S. Open singles champions Carlos Alcaraz and Emma Raducanu were quickly eliminated with a 4-2, 4-2 loss to Jessica Pegula and Jack Draper, the No. 1-seeded team. The No. 2 seeds, Taylor Fritz and Elena Rybakina, also went quickly in a 4-2, 4-2 loss to Errani and Vavassori.
Fritz, last year’s U.S. Open runner-up in men’s singles, and Rybakina, a past Wimbledon women’s singles champion, are exactly the types of players the U.S. Tennis Association was seeking when it revamped the tournament.
Now a 16-team event played over two days, mixed doubles starts well before the singles tournaments begin on Sunday, with organizers believing singles stars would be more interested in playing if it didn’t interfere with their rest and recovery during that event.
Traditional doubles specialists like Errani and Vavassori were among the biggest critics of the changes. Even Karolina Muchova referred to the event as an exhibition during the postmatch interview after her team's opening victory over Venus Williams and Reilly Opelka.
The prize of $1 million to the winning team would be a huge boost to doubles players, but Errani and Vavassori are the only traditional doubles team in the event.
“We also are playing for all the doubles players who could not compete here, so we tried to do our best,” Vavassori said.
Errani and Vavassori didn't even know originally if they would get a chance to defend their title in the new format, which gives eight teams automatic spots based on the players' combined singles rankings. The other spots are wild cards awarded by the USTA.
The Italians were given one of them and they showed off their skills in a first-round victory that took just 42 minutes. The shortened format allows the matches to speed by, knowing winning teams would have to play twice on the first day to reach the semifinals and finals on Wednesday night.
When Errani and Vavassori won the title last year in Flushing Meadows, it was late in the second week of the tournament in a stadium with plenty of empty seats.
The new schedule has mixed doubles being played now when usually the only competitions taking place are the qualifying events for the singles tournaments. Admission onto the grounds during what the USTA calls “fan week” is free, so Louis Armstrong Stadium stadium was packed for the opening match, a far bigger crowd than mixed doubles generally draws.
Some fans may not have even realized that the match was headed to a second set after Errani and Vavassori took the opener in just 19 minutes. In traditional tennis scoring, they would have had to win 6 games instead of 4 to win the set.
"I think some people could easily view it as they had to do less work to win the match. Stamina’s definitely less of a factor now that sets are only to four in the first two rounds, but I think it’s good," Jay Maresco of New York said after watching the Italians' second-round victory. “It keeps the pace going. It’s definitely better for the U.S. Open to keep the matches going in and out faster and more people in and out of Armstrong.”
The sets to four games with a 10-point match tiebreaker instead of a third set were used through the semifinals. Only the final would resemble a regular match, with sets to six games, tiebreakers at 6-all and a 10-point tiebreak for a third set.
Teams were still being withdrawn and entered into the final hours, with top-ranked Jannik Sinner pulling out Tuesday morning after getting ill during his loss to Alcaraz on Monday in the Cincinnati final.
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