American racing: which of the Russians continues to fight at the US Open

Only two representatives of Russia, Andrey Rublev and Ekaterina Alexandrova, received the right to continue fighting for the main trophy in the second week of the US Open in singles. The national ranking leaders Karen Khachanov and Mirra Andreeva did not live up to expectations, losing to less stellar rivals in the early stages of the Grand Slam tournament in New York. The 25th seed Felix Auger-Alliassim from Canada is waiting for Rublev in the fourth round, and the second racket of the Polish Iga Sventek is waiting for Alexandrova.

The Polish Trial

Shortly before the start of the US Open, Alexandrova reached the finals at the Pentathlon in Mexico, but failed to take her second title of the year, losing in the final to compatriot Diana Schneider. The Abierto GNP Seguros-2025 champion took off in New York in the first round, losing to 37-year-old German Laura Siegemund. (6:7, 6:2, 3:6). But Ekaterina has already managed to win three matches at the US Open, including, ironically— against the same Siegemund. Moreover— they can win more than confidently. The Russian second racket has spent just over three hours on three matches and has conceded only ten games so far. Maybe this athlete doesn't look too bright, but at the moment she is the most stable of our girls. Under certain circumstances, Alexandrova will be able to reach the top 10 by the end of this year.

Before the start of the "major", few people could have imagined that Ekaterina would be the only representative of our country in the women's singles draw in the second week of the World Cup. However, Mirra Andreeva, Lyudmila Samsonova, Diana Schneider and Veronika Kudermetova performed below their abilities. As a result, Alexandrova, who has never gone beyond the fourth round of a Grand Slam tournament in her career, will now have to fight for everyone. However, it will still be difficult for Ekaterina to improve this result, because her next opponent is the champion of Wimbledon 2025 and the recent "thousandth" in Cincinnati, Iga Sventek, who lost only one of her last 19 matches.

"Anna acted great," Sventek admitted after a tough match with Kalinskaya in the third round of the US Open. — She scored all the risky goals, just like in our match in Dubai last year. But I felt that the game was going on, and I just wanted to make fewer mistakes. When the score was 1-5 in the first set, I realized that I had nothing left to lose, so I acted without thinking about anything. I had no other choice, and I'm not sure how I got that set out. Actually, it was my hardest match against Kalinskaya. And I'm glad that I was able to win.

Let's remind that Kalinskaya sensationally beat Sventek, who was then the first racket of the world, in the semifinals of the "thousandth" in Dubai in February 2024. But now the attempt to repeat this result has failed. Losing 1:5, Iga increased dramatically, brought the matter to a tiebreak and eventually justified the status of the main favorite of the US Open. It is not entirely clear what can oppose Alexandrov's polka to such a game. Although, as we know, Sventek is not made of iron either, and she sometimes has failures.

Doubles challenge: what awaits Andreeva and Rublev in the fight to reach the second week of the US Open

Our top tennis players look confident on the courts of New York

We've reached the fifth

Meanwhile, our main hope in doubles took the next step in the tournament bracket. Mirra Andreeva and Diana Schneider, the winners of the Miami Major, defeated Storm Hunter from Australia and Desiree Krawczyk from the United States in just 58 minutes in the second round. MiDi will compete with Japanese Shuko Aoyama and Chinese Wang Yafan to reach the quarterfinals at Flushing Meadows. For both Russians, the doubles performance was a great opportunity to rehabilitate themselves for their failure in the singles draw. Although they can hardly be called favorites of the doubles tournament. Czech Katerina Sinyakova and American Taylor Townsend are seeded number one in New York, while Italian Olympic champions Sara Errani and Jasmine Paolini remain the second pair of competitors.

Among men, only Andrey Rublev made it to the fourth round, defeating his opponent from Hong Kong, Coleman Wong, in three hours. Everything was decided in the decisive fifth set. In it, the tennis players were on equal terms, exchanging games until the sixth game — in it Rublev confidently made a break, catching Coleman on a mistake.

It became fatal for Wong — he could not return to the game. Andrey did not give him his serves and took away the most difficult match.

Rublev is a good boy. After all the stories with psychological problems, the tennis player has obviously improved — this year he reached the fourth round of the Grand Slam tournament for the third time in a row.

Unfortunately, he never went further — he lost to Yannick Sinner at Roland Garros and Carlos Alcaraz at Wimbledon. Of course, the rivals were like a match (both are finalists of the last two World Championships), in this regard, it will be easier in New York. Rublev will play Felix Auger-Alliassim, who unexpectedly stopped the third-seeded Alexander Zverev.