On the court, the Italian world No 1 has become a model of consistency, not least on hard courts, where his 6-3, 6-4, 7-5 victory over Fritz, the American 12th seed, means he has now won 35 of his 37 matches this year. The foundations for a breakout season were laid with a maiden grand slam title at the Australian Open in January, since when Sinner has won a tour-leading six titles. It has been a historic campaign for the 23-year-old, who becomes the first Italian man to win the US Open, and the youngest male player in the open era to win on hard courts at Melbourne Park and Flushing Meadows in the same calendar year. 

Yet for many, Sinner has become an embodiment of inconsistency, given the speed and secrecy with which he was cleared of wrongdoing after a banned substance was detected in his system six months ago. So many players have lost months and even years of their careers in similar circumstances, but here was Sinner, claiming his second grand slam title just 19 days after news broke that he was inadvertently contaminated with clostebol, an anabolic steroid, while receiving massage treatment from Giacomo Naldi, his former physiotherapist.

Granted, on a purely sporting level it is hard not to admire the poise with which Sinner has negotiated his campaign in New York. Since dropping a set against Mackenzie McDonald in the opening round, he has been largely flawless, keeping his head while the likes of Carlos Alcaraz and Novak Djokovic were losing theirs as he rose above the bonfire of the seeds elsewhere in the draw. Having dispatched Tommy Paul, Daniil Medvedev and his friend Jack Draper in straight sets to reach his first final in New York, Sinner had too much for Fritz on a day when the 26-year-old Californian struggled to find his best tennis until it was too late. 

Yet it is easy to forget that Sinner has had a lot more time to come to terms with the situation than the rest of the tennis world. He has been dealing with the fallout for months now; it would be strange if he had not found a way of coping. Darren Cahill, one half of Sinner’s coaching team alongside Simone Vagnozzi, admitted on the eve of the tournament that the episode had taken a significant mental and emotional toll on his charge. What was not clear at that time was whether Sinner would be liberated or distracted by the public revelation of the news. A fortnight on, we have the answer.

“It was and is still a little bit in my mind,” said Sinner. “It’s not that it’s gone, but when I’m on court I try to focus [on] the game, I try to handle the situation in the best possible way.

“Me and my team and the people who are close to me, they know what I’ve been through in the last months. It was not only one week before the tournament, it was months. 

“Obviously, it was very difficult for me to enjoy [tennis] in certain moments. How I behaved, or how I walked on the court in certain tournaments before, it was not the same as I used to be. So whoever knows me better, they knew that something was wrong.

“But during this tournament, slowly I really started to feel a little bit more how I am as a person. It doesn’t really matter how or what the result was, this tournament, for sure, helped me a little bit.”

For Fritz, playing his first grand slam final, it could hardly have mattered more. It has been 21 years since an American man last won a major, and from Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce to Matthew McConaughey, Dustin Hoffman and Jon Bon Jovi, the stars were out in force to support their countryman as he attempted to emulate Andy Roddick’s 2003 triumph at Flushing Meadows. But the tennis that carried Fritz past a pair of multiple grand slam finalists in Casper Ruud and Alexander Zverev, and then earned him an emotional semi-final win over US team-mate Frances Tiafoe, proved elusive.

The tone was set in the opening game, where a bungled bounce smash cost the big-serving American an instant break. Already Sinner was setting exacting standards from the back of the court, and although Fritz immediately recovered to get back on serve, it was not long before the Italian’s superior ball-striking told again. At 3-3, Fritz followed a wayward forehand with a double fault to gift his opponent two break points, and Sinner snatched the opportunity, forcing the American off the baseline with a blizzard of punishing groundstrokes before applying the coup de grâce with a drop shot. With his first serve percentage languishing at 38%, Fritz was broken again as Sinner wrapped up the set. The tactical conundrum facing the American was clear.

“He’s the best player in the world right now,” said Fritz. “[When] my plan A is not working, the plan B that I fall back on would normally be just like bringing everything in, being a little bit safer, grinding it out. That works, along with my serve, against a lot of other players. 

“But when I try to bring it down, not be as aggressive, then he’s just going to bully me too much. It was tough that my plan A wasn’t really working for me until the third set.”

In short, Fritz was in deep trouble. In the final game of an otherwise service-dominated second set, Sinner raised his level to break with a laser-like backhand down the line. He had made just one unforced error. When Sinner held two break points for a 4-2 lead in the third, the finish line was in sight.

Fritz, however, was not done. Encouraged by his opponent’s failure to punish an inviting second serve, he outlasted Sinner to win a 21-shot rally, then drilled a pair of unanswerable forehands to hold. Suddenly, he was on a roll, pulling Sinner opponent hither and thither with a drop-shot-and-lob routine, nailing an overhead, blasting his way to the net to slot home a volley. Sinner double-faulted to surrender his serve, and in short space Fritz was serving for the set.

Finally, the home crowd had something to shout about. But amid the mayhem that ensued, Sinner remained the coolest head in the house. He broke with a sledgehammer forehand and a teasing drop shot that left Fritz off balance at the net, then powered through his next service game to move within touching distance of the title. In the final game, as Fritz laboured to force a tiebreak, Sinner produced some brilliant defensive play. Unable to find a way past the scrambling Italian, Fritz was hoisted by his own petard, a final despairing forehand dipping into the net.

With Sinner’s victory, men’s tennis enters a new era. This season is the first since 2002 that none of the “big three” of Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic have won a major. Instead, Sinner and Alcaraz – the champion in Paris and Wimbledon – have carved up the honours between them. 

“It is a bit different, for sure,” said Sinner. “It’s something new, but it’s also nice to see new champions, nice to see new rivalries.”

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Not this time; not here in Arthur Ashe Stadium; not again.

So when Jessica Pegula courageously fought back to level the first set after trailing 5-2, Sabalenka did not let her mind drift back to last September, when she was unable to capitalise on a similarly auspicious start against Coco Gauff. She did not dwell on the succession of heartbreaks she has suffered at Flushing Meadows, where she has made the semi-finals or better in each of the past three years only to be undone by Leylah Fernandez, Iga Swiatek and Gauff.

This time, when she held two break points early in the second set, just as she had done against Gauff last year, Sabalenka drove home the advantage. Even when Pegula, New York-born and willed on by a febrile crowd, rose from the canvas a second time to reel off five straight games and bring an absorbing contest to the brink of a decider, the Belarusian world No 2 did not blench. Her resolve was rewarded with a 7-5, 7-5 victory and a third grand slam trophy to sit alongside her two Australian Open crowns. 

“I thought that I would be thinking a lot about previous years here, because I had a lot of tough lessons here at the US Open, very difficult ones I would say, especially last year,” said Sabalenka after marking her 100th grand slam match with a repeat of her straight-sets victory over Pegula in Cincinnati. “But today I just kept reminding myself that this is the US Open final, of course she’s going to fight really hard for it and it’s not going to be easy, and I have to work really hard to get it. 

“In those tough moments, I was just trying to stay strong and remind myself that I’ve been through a lot and I’m strong enough to hold under this pressure. So I’m actually really glad that I didn’t have any [flashbacks to] last year.

“It’s a very special place here, the US Open, and I had a lot of tough losses in the past. I was always hoping that one day I’ll be able to hold this beautiful trophy, it’s been always my dream. That’s why it’s very special because, no matter what, every time I was coming back stronger and I was learning. I never gave up on this dream, and that means a lot.”

At the age of 26, Sabalenka is beginning to carve a niche alongside some of the greatest names in the sport’s history. With her latest victory, she joins Angelique Kerber as the second woman this century to win the Australian and US Open in the same season. Since 1988, meanwhile, when both events were held on hard courts for the first time, only Steffi Graf, Monica Seles and Martina Hingis have completed the rarefied double. The only other female players in the open era to do it are Margaret Court, Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova. Sabalenka’s father Sergey, who died in 2019, would have been proud.

“After I lost my father it’s always been my goal to put our family name in the history of tennis,” said Sabalenka. “Every time I see my name on that trophy, I’m so proud of myself and proud of my family that they never gave up on my dream and that they were doing everything they could to keep me going. I had this opportunity in life, so it really means a lot.”

Pegula too has dreamed of such moments. Before this week, the 30-year-old had lost all six of the grand slam quarter-finals she had contested. Having finally broken that duck with an inspired win over perennial nemesis Iga Swiatek, the sixth seed gave everything in pursuit of a first title at this level. Buoyed by a raucous reception as she emerged on to Ashe for the biggest match of her career, Pegula immediately made clear her determination to play the match on the front foot. She responded to an early ace from Sabalenka with an untouchable serve of her own as she levelled at a game apiece, then moved inside the baseline to drill a huge forehand return at the Belarusian’s feet and claim the first break.

Pegula’s aggression carried her within a point of consolidating her advantage before Sabalenka decided she had seen enough. A blazing forehand winner pulled the score back to deuce. Then, showcasing the variety she has added to her game over the past year, the Belarusian tempted Pegula into error with a floated defensive slice. A blazing return secured the break back, and from there Sabalenka began to dominate. She bossed the baseline exchanges. She made successful forays to the net. She slammed down serves at speeds of up to 119mph and won four straight games. It seemed a rout might be on the cards.

Then, the worm turned. Pegula played a strong service game. Errors began creeping into Sabalenka’s play. As the Belarusian served for the set, a double fault brought up a break point for Pegula. Sabalenka saved it with a booming forehand, but then made two straight errors off the same wing. Pegula, quietly confident but never cocksure, did her best to orchestrate the crowd, waving her arms slightly awkwardly. It did the trick. With an explosion of patriotic fervour still ringing in her ears, she played another fine service game to level at 5-5. Remarkably, she had won 14 of the previous 18 points. For Sabalenka, still nursing the scars of all those past disappointments, it must have felt like groundhog day. 

When another double fault gifted Pegula a break point that would have left her serving for the set, Sabalenka was left beating at the ground in fury. She averted the danger with a courageous backhand winner that kissed the back edge of the baseline, but she was flirting with disaster. 

Pegula was now returning with depth and conviction, so much so that Sabalenka attempted a 111mph second serve. Inevitably, it resulted in another double fault. But the world No 2 kept swinging, and after eight tense minutes she finally held. Pegula saved four set points in the next game, the initiative swinging back and forth until a double fault from the American handed Sabalenka a fifth. Now she offered another reminder of her expanded repertoire, sealing the set with a deft backhand that was part drop shot, part short, angled slice.

“It’s really good to have these options in your pocket,” said Sabalenka. “Sometimes you don’t feel your best on the baseline, and you can just go for a slice, or a drop shot, or come to the net. I’ve always worked on this variation on the court, and I’m really glad that that I’m brave enough to use these tools in those key moments.”

They were needed again when Pegula, having recovered from 3-0 down in the second set, served to force a decider at 5-4. Sabalenka began the game with a wonderful display of balletic athleticism, rising to angle away a high backhand volley with her back to the court. She ended it in signature style, slamming a forehand winner on to the sideline to break. She would not be caught again. 

“I have to go for it, that’s the only way it works for me,” smiled Sabalenka. 

As this victory proved, that is no longer altogether true. When Pegula sent a final forehand long, signalling the end of her resistance, Sabalenka sunk to her knees and then collapsed on her back, her body shaking with emotion. After a consolatory hug for the American, she made her way into the stands, half-crying, half-laughing, before celebrating wildly with her support team. It is unlikely to be the last time we witness such scenes.

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The 7-5, 7-6 (7-3), 6-2 victory that carried Sinner, the world No 1, into a first US Open final was not a matter of strategy and deliberation, so much as the survival of the fittest. Draper, the British 25th seed, who had reached his maiden grand slam semi-final without dropping a set, showed an abundance of quality and guts – a little too literally in the latter case, given his repeated vomiting – but it was Sinner who coped better with the clammy, airless conditions in Arthur Ashe Stadium, recovering from a jarring mid-match fall to prevail in three hours and three minutes.

The contest turned on a gruelling second set in which Draper, not for the first time, was forced to battle his body as well as his opponent. Drenched in sweat and gripped by anxiety, the 22-year-old vomited three times, and although he courageously clung on to his serve throughout, Sinner raised his level in the climactic tiebreak to establish an unassailable lead. 

It was a bitter blow for Draper, who has worked so hard to strengthen his body after the catalogue of injuries that marred his early career, but admits that the anxiety he feels in big moments often manifests itself physically. After an early exchange of breaks, the Briton matched Sinner virtually step for step until 5-5 in the opening set, where an angst-ridden struggle on serve culminated with a double fault. Sinner served out the set with aplomb, and Draper said afterwards that it was in the next game, punctuated by a string of punishing rallies as the Italian pushed for an early break, that his condition began to deteriorate in earnest. 

“At 5-5 [I the first set] we had a really tight game,” said Draper. “Sometimes in the matches you feel an anxious build-up in certain moments, and I definitely felt like that was a big game. I threw in a couple of double faults, I think it was deuce a few times, and then when I came out for the first game in the second set, he was obviously trying to get the break first game. I managed to hold him off, but was definitely starting to not feel great in that moment.

“Even though I generally feel pretty relaxed and stuff, I definitely felt a little bit more excited today, a few more nerves around. I’m definitely someone who’s quite an anxious human being. I think when you add all that together sometimes, I do feel a bit [of] nausea on court, and I do feel a little bit sick when it gets tough.”

No player is immune to nerves, and Draper will undoubtedly learn from the experience. Sinner demonstrated his own strength in dealing with adversity by recovering from a huge scare in the ninth game, when he tumbled backwards after scrambling to retrieve a ball deep behind the baseline, jarring his left wrist. While it did not prevent him from winning the point with a thumping forehand pass, medical staff were on overtime at the ensuing changeover, a doctor administering medication to Draper as a physio worked on Sinner’s wrist. 

“The physio loosened it up very fast on court, so after I felt OK,” said Sinner, who grimaced as he received treatment. “Then after it went away by playing, which is good. Let’s see how it is tomorrow, when it’s cold, [if] it’s going to be a different feeling. Hopefully it’s nothing to be concerned about. I’m quite relaxed because, if it’s something bad, you feel it straightaway a bit more. Let’s see how it is.”

A fortnight that began with Sinner addressing the revelation that an independent tribunal cleared him of wrongdoing after he twice tested positive for a banned substance earlier this year, will now conclude with him seeking to win his second major of the season, following his maiden title at the Australian Open in January. In Sunday’s final, the 23-year-old will face Taylor Fritz, the American 12th seed, who later defeatedhis compatriot Frances Tiafoe 4-6, 7-5, 4-6, 6-4, 6-1 to become the first homegrown US Open finalist since Andy Roddick in 2006. Fritz, who has never previously advanced beyond the last eight of a major, said it was a challenge he would relish.

“I’ve always played well against Jannik, I think we’re one and one [in previous meetings],” said the 26-year-old Californian, who defeated Sinner in Indian Wells three years ago before the Italian returned the favour at the same venue last spring. 

“It’s been a while since we played, but last time he got me in three at Indian Wells. He hits the ball big, he’s a very strong ball-striker, but I feel Iike I always hit the ball really nice off of his ball. I think I typically play well against him.”

Fritz was not always at his best against Tiafoe, chiefly because his fellow American would not allow it. Having won the first three games – perhaps not altogether unexpectedly, given that his only loss in seven previous meetings with the 2022 semi-finalist came eight years ago – Fritz abruptly found himself confronted by a very different player. As Tiafoe seized the initiative by reeling off six of the next seven games, electrifying the crowd with his ebullient shot-making, the match began to assume a fresh complexion. Fritz hit back to level, breaking late in a service-dominated second set, but when Tiafoe broke early in the third to move ahead by two sets to one, the match appeared to be on his racket. 

Serving at 4-5 in the fourth set, Tiafoe appeared to be closing in on a famous victory. Instead, he frittered away two game points with a pair of double faults, butchered a forehand, and tamely netted a drop shot to hand Fritz the set. With the contest even and cramp setting in, Tiafoe was a double break down in the decider before he knew what had hit him. The match was over in all but name.

“I was the better player for sure tonight,” said a disconsolate Tiafoe. “In the fourth set, I just had some in-and-out cramps. I felt like my body just kind of shut down on me.” 

Draper would no doubt sympathise. 

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If ever there was a time and place to alter that narrative, however, it was at this US Open of myriad upsetsand notable American success. And on Wednesday night, the 30-year-old New Yorker did just that, producing a poised, patient and disciplined performance to see off Swiatek in straight sets and reach her first grand slam semi-final. Tellingly, for all her evident joy at emulating the success of her compatriots Taylor Fritz and Frances Tiafoe, whose meeting on Friday will ensure an American presence in a men’s singles final at Flushing Meadows for the first time since 2006, Pegula’s overriding emotion was relief at ending her quarter-final hoodoo.

“I’ve been [to the last eight] so many freaking times, I just kept losing – but to great players, to girls that went on and won the tournament,” said Pegula after her 6-2, 6-4 victory. “So I know everyone keeps asking me about it, but I was like, ‘I don’t know what else to do, I just need to get there again and win the match.’ Thank God I was able to do it and finally – finally! – I can say, ‘Semi-finalist.’”

The foundations for that breakthrough were laid early. With 21 minutes gone, Swiatek had racked up a dozen unforced errors and been broken twice, each time on a double fault. Pegula, meanwhile, was commanding the baseline exchanges, maintaining immaculate length with her flat, powerful groundstrokes, refusing to give ground or be rushed. Tellingly, Swiatek did not hit a single winner in those first four games. By the end of the set, the Pole had put just 36% of her first serves into play and was chattering agitatedly to her team. It was a dream start for Pegula.

“I wanted to come out playing the way I wanted to play,” said Pegula. “I had an idea in my mind of what I learned from the last time I played her at [the WTA] Finals, and [I wanted to] play within myself and then just see where she was at. 

“I could tell right away that she was frustrated on the serve, and then I was like, ‘OK.’ I wanted to attack the serve pretty early, but it depends on how she’s serving: am I going to get a lot of second serve looks, am I not? So once I saw that [her serve] wasn’t really working that well, I made it a point to really try and step in and try to keep doing that the entire time.

“I started off playing well, so I just kind of tried to stay within myself and then adjust according to how she was playing.”

With a dismal start behind her, Swiatek began the second set in stronger vein, running Pegula from pillar to post to seal a convincing early hold. But the American world No 6, who has worked hard to improve her movement, remained unperturbed. As Swiatek lapsed back into error, Pegula broke to go ahead again, and although the top seed hit back immediately, there was a palpable lack of confidence about her play, particularly off the forehand. With the ball flying off Swiatek’s strings and Pegula showing some resourceful defensive play, things came to a head in the seventh game. Fighting to raise her level, Swiatek saved two break points but could not fend off a third, drilling a forehand into the alley off a slow, floated slice. There would be no way back. 

“It’s never easy to play against Jess,” said Swiatek. “She has a tricky ball, because it’s pretty low and pretty flat. I wouldn’t say she changed a lot, because it’s impossible to change your game style. 

“But for sure she was more solid than me and making much less mistakes, so was putting pressure with that. Usually I’m able to push it back, or put pressure on myself, but today I just made too many mistakes.”

From her buggy-whip forehand and mental and physical intensity to her domination at Roland Garros, where she has won four of her five grand slam titles, Swiatek has often been likened to her hero, Rafael Nadal. Over the course of a difficult summer, another point of comparison has become discernible. Just as Nadal used to dominate the clay-court season only to find the tank depleted later in the season, so Swiatek – crowned champion in Madrid, Rome and Paris before suffering unexpected defeats to Yulia Putintseva at Wimbledon and Qinwen Zheng at the Olympics – appears to be paying the price for a successful summer on the red dirt. 

Has the Pole hit the wall? Despite her improvement in the second set, this was a startlingly poor display by her standards. Swiatek’s serve, the mainstay of her progress as she advanced to the last eight without dropping a set, largely deserted her, the 23-year-old winning just 56% of points behind her first delivery. By the end of the night, she had committed 41 unforced errors – the same number she made in the opening round against Kamilla Rakhimova, with the crucial difference being that here she managed only a dozen winners, 18 fewer than she conjured against the Russian. It was, as Swiatek acknowledged, too much to overcome.

“I was telling myself that I can still play well from the baseline and I’ve had many tournaments when I didn’t serve well and I managed to win anyway,” said Swiatek. “But I probably didn’t find the right solution, because I couldn’t push on my serve. Also, I wasn’t that solid from the baseline to have a backup like that. You’re not going to win if you make so many mistakes.”

Not against Pegula, at any rate; not with the American in this form. Pegula will now face Karolina Muchova, who underwent wrist surgery in February but returned to the semi-finals for a second straight year with a 6-1, 6-4 win over Beatriz Haddad Maia. Like Pegula, the 28-year-old Czech, unseeded but with talent in abundance, has yet to drop a set. It will be far from straightforward, but it is an opportunity: three weeks ago in Cincinnati, Pegula won the first career meeting between the pair in three sets. A maiden grand slam final could arrive a lot quicker for Pegula than her first semi-final did. 

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In the latest coming-of-age performance of a fortnight that has been full of them, Jack Draper maintained his seamless progress at the US Open to become the first British man to reach the semi-finals since Murray won the title in 2012. Yet to drop a set in New York, the 22-year-old marked his maiden appearance in Arthur Ashe Stadium with a 6-3, 7-5, 6-2 win over Alex de Minaur, the Australian 10th seed, who was clearly hampered by a hip problem but never stopped fighting.

Draper likewise knows what it is to labour with injury, and as he sat at courtside afterwards removing the various straps and supports holding his battle-scarred body together, it was hard not to recall the various physical issues that have stalled his career, most notably when a shoulder injury forced him to miss Wimbledon last year. There was a brief scare here, too, when he called for the trainer early in the second set to get his right thigh strapped. But Draper has become accustomed to dealing with adversity, and his first act on returning to the fray was to batter down one of the 11 aces he produced on the day. 

“I’ve been working so hard for such a long time now,” said Draper. “Last year was a real turning point for me, when I had my injury setbacks and took a lot of time off over the summer because of my shoulder injury. 

“I had to watch all these young, amazing players winning amazing tournaments and playing on the biggest stages in the world, and I felt like I just wasn’t doing enough to get to that point myself. 

“So this is not an overnight thing for me. I’ve believed for a long time that I’m putting in the work and doing the right things, and I knew that my time would come. I didn’t know when it would be, but hopefully from here I can do a lot of amazing things.”

Draper’s progress to this point has certainly been remarkable. When the fortnight began with the British southpaw still smarting from the controversial conclusion to his win over Felix Auger-Aliassime in Cincinnati, where a double bounce went unnoticed by the chair umpire, few would have anticipated Draper emerging from a quarter headed by Carlos Alcaraz, the French Open and Wimbledon champion. But the Spaniard’s shock second-round defeat to Botic van de Zandschulp, combined with Hubert Hurkacz’s exit at the same stage, created an opportunity that Draper has gleefully embraced, dispatching Van de Zandschulp and Tomas Machac with minimal fuss before claiming the fourth top-10 win of his career against De Minaur. 

Naysayers will point out that none of those opponents came close to doing themselves justice, and that is true. Van de Zandschulp suffered a mental and emotional letdown following his win over Alcaraz, Machac’s game crumbled as rapidly as his composure, and De Minaur’s fleet-footed movement, perhaps his most dangerous weapon, was clearly compromised as he continues to manage the fallout from the torn hip cartilage that forced him to pull out of Wimbledon. Draper is sure to face a sterner test against Jannik Sinner, with whom he shares a close friendship, after the Italian world No 1 later saw off Daniil Medvedev 6-2, 1-6, 6-1, 6-4 to book his place in the last four. 

Yet you can do no more than beat the player on the opposite side of the net, and Draper has met every challenge he has faced with composure and maturity. That was particularly true of his tussle with De Minaur, where he avoided the pitfall of abandoning his gameplan in favour of trying to capitalise on his stricken opponent’s injury. There was a brief moment of crisis for Draper when, having held break points that would have given him a 5-2 lead in the second set, he instead found himself serving to stay in it at 4-5. To his credit, though, he immediately steadied himself to see out the set and, in short space, the most important win of his career.

“It is a challenge playing someone who maybe isn’t 100%,” said Draper. “Towards the end of the first set, I didn’t know that he was struggling with injury, but I definitely noticed he was a bit subdued. That made me realise he maybe had something slightly wrong, but then again maybe I was hurting a little bit as well. So it was a bit of a strange situation.

“I definitely felt in the second set I had a few opportunities, and it was there for me to take the set pretty early on, but I didn’t. I think part of that was to do with maybe focusing on myself too much, and not realising what was going on the other side of the court. 

“It’s tough, you know, I was playing someone who moves still pretty well and was making balls. It was kind of difficult to play the way I wanted to play, I started becoming more passive and was playing for him to miss instead of the playing the tennis that I’m supposed to be playing, which is to be aggressive, to be on the front foot.”

Whatever happens over the next few days, Draper is certainly on the front foot now. Comparisons with Emma Raducanu, whose surprise run from qualifying into the main draw culminated with a shock title win three years ago, are inescapable. As Raducanu would be the first to admit, however, the sport moves on; her title run is old news. British tennis has a new leading light – and, like Murray before him, Draper is forging his own path.

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The former champion, all but one of whose five grand slam titles have come at Roland Garros, will face Jessica Pegula for a place in the semi-finals on Wednesday night, just as she did in 2022. Swiatek ran out a 6-3, 7-6 (7-4) winner that day – an encouraging precedent from her perspective, no doubt, but one unlikely to have any bearing on the rematch, given that she barely recalls it.

“I don’t remember a lot,” said Swiatek. “I remember it was the first match in 2022 where I felt like the ball is kind of listening to me a little bit more, and that’s the only thing. I don’t remember [the] specifics of how that match went, I don’t even remember the score, so I can’t really say a lot. I haven’t watched this game [since], so that’s why probably.”

There is another reason why Swiatek’s memory of the fortnight is based more on impressions than details. Having arrived in New York that year complaining that the balls were too light to control, her title-winning run was a largely pragmatic, attritional affair rather than a Carlos Alcaraz-style highlights reel. The satisfaction she felt afterwards owed more to the outcome than the experience.

“I wouldn’t say I played my best game or whatever that year, so it was a big surprise for me that I could win this tournament, because I felt like I kind of won it ugly,” said Swiatek after advancing to the quarter-finals with a far from unsightly 6-4, 6-1 victory over Liudmila Samsonova.

“That’s why I probably [don’t remember]. But I was fighting every match for every ball, and my defence was pretty great. So on the other hand, I understand why I won this tournament.”

Should she repeat that achievement on Saturday, Swiatek is likely to recall her latest campaign in New York with greater clarity. Since a shaky opening match against Kamilla Rakhimova, a lucky loser who came within a whisker of forcing a third set, the former champion has progressed through the upper half of the draw with calm authority, brushing aside Ena Shibahara, Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova and Samsonova in straight sets. This time, though, her success has been built less on an ability to scrap and retrieve, and more on the excellence of her vastly improved service.

That might seem an unlikely claim to make about a player more noted for her dominant play off the ground and wing-heeled athleticism. The evidence, however, is compelling. Swiatek remains unbroken across her past three matches. No player left in the draw has won more service games, and among that cohort of survivors only Qinwen Zheng – dismissed 6-1, 6-2 by Aryna Sabalenka in Tuesday’s night session – had claimed more points behind her first delivery going into the quarter-finals (80% to 79%). On second serve, meanwhile, Swiatek leads the field with a 64% success rate.

Those statistics are indicative of the work the 23-year-old has put in behind the scenes to produce a smoother and more compact motion, the fruits of which are evident in the five titles she has won this season, including a fourth in five years at Roland Garros. Yet having a good serve and knowing what to do with it are two very different things.

A service-dominated first set against the 16th-seeded Samsonova showcased Swiatek’s growing variety and tactical nous with ball in hand. While touching speeds of up to 115mph, the Pole also leavened the mix with regular changes of pace and direction. That was never more evident than when, eschewing her natural tendency to pull the opponent wide in the advantage court, she closed out two consecutive first-set services games with devastatingly accurate serves down the centre line. The deft manner in which Swiatek navigated such moments laid the foundations for a victory that, once she broke for the first time to claim the set, assumed an air of inevitably.

 “At the beginning I felt like we were playing kind of men’s style, just holding our serves,” Swiatek told Rennae Stubbs on court afterwards. “But I knew that if I kept pushing I would get some chances to break Mila. That happened in the last game of the first set, and I’m happy that I was there to close it. In the second set I was leading, and I just wanted to keep being focused, not let my mind drift off.”

Samsonova may lack the grand slam pedigree of Jelena Ostapenko, the former French Open champion who defeated Swiatek in the fourth round last year, but the Russian is not without the tools to discomfit Swiatek on a fast hard court. Taking a leaf out of the Ostapenko playbook, she did all she could to rush the top seed with her flat, powerful groundstrokes and heavy serve, and in the fifth game she threatened to make inroads, some mighty hitting bringing up 0-30 on Swiatek’s serve. The Pole refused to be flustered, however, setting up her forehand with a pair of solid first serves.

It was ideal preparation for facing Pegula, another clean, flat ball-striker. Swiatek is in no danger of becoming a servebot just yet, but the ability to win the occasional free point on serve will do her no harm as she seeks a seventh win over the 30-year-old American in what will be their 10th meeting. Notably, all three of Pegula’s wins have come on hard courts, although the pair have not played since last November’s showdown at the WTA Finals in Cancún, where she was on the wrong end of a 6-1, 6-0 drubbing.

Seeded sixth at Flushing Meadows, Pegula has likewise made improvements to her game since that meeting. Her outstanding form over the North American hard-court swing, which has brought a successful defence of her Canadian Open title and a final appearance in Cincinnati, has seen her defeated just once in her past 14 matches, and her impressive 6-4, 6-2 win over Diana Shnaider in the previous round suggests Swiatek will have her work cut out.

“I feel like my movement has really improved, which has really helped me stay in a lot of these points and these sets and these games and be super consistent,” said Pegula. “I think I’ve been serving pretty well. Even if it’s not working, I’ve been getting myself out of service games by serving smart or serving well in big moments.”

On Wednesday night, the American can expect to see those skills mirrored at the opposite end of the court. Like Swiatek, she has yet to drop a set; unlike Swiatek, she has failed to advance beyond a grand slam quarter-final in six previous attempts. Two of those defeats came at the hands of the Pole, and her return game will need to be at its best if she is to alter that narrative. We are unlikely to see a repeat of the 13 breaks the players shared in their quarter-final meeting two years ago.

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In an echo of her defeat at the same stage of Wimbledon two months ago, the American world No 3 was upended in the fourth round by her compatriot Emma Navarro, the 13th seed, whose remarkable journey at Flushing Meadows continued with a tenacious 6-3, 4-6, 6-3 win.

Before last week, Navarro had never even won a match in New York, much less squared off against the defending champion on Arthur Ashe Stadium. But the 23-year-old New Yorker ensured her debut on the sport’s biggest stage was a memorable one, living up to her “ice girl” nickname with a composed, intelligent performance that ruthlessly exposed the technical deficiencies in Gauff’s game.

In the city they famously named twice, as the old song goes, Navarro effectively earned victory twice, first when she stood within two games of repeating her straight-sets victory over Gauff on Wimbledon’s Centre Court, then when she regrouped after faltering in the face of a typically impassioned fightback from Gauff.

Yet Navarro was also the beneficiary of a woeful serving performance from Gauff, who hit 19 double faults and made a whopping 60 unforced errors in all. Twenty-nine of those mistakes came on the champion’s forehand, which disintegrated under the relentless pressure exerted by Navarro.

It was a far cry from the wonders of last summer, when Gauff won a first WTA 500 title in Washington, a maiden 1000 event in Cincinnati, and then became the first American teenager to triumph at a major since Serena Williams won at Flushing Meadows in 1999. She is hardly the first player to struggle under the weight of expectation that accompanies the defence of a first grand slam title, but the manner of her defeat exposed deeper problems.

It was not only the quantity of double faults that cost Gauff so dearly, but also their timing. In the sixth game, she hit two in a row from 15-30 to concede a break that would decide the first set. At 3-3, 30-30 in the second set, her eighth double fault of the evening gifted Navarro a break point that put the world No 12 within touching distance of victory. And although Gauff capitalised on a first hint of vulnerability from Navarro to wriggle out of that hole, worse was to follow in the decider, where she dropped serve in the third game with back-to-back double faults and never recovered. Three more in the final game completed her misery.

“I played well for the most part, I just didn’t take care of my serve,” said Gauff, who did not rule out the possibility of consulting a biomechanics expert, as Aryna Sabalenka did so successfully in similar circumstances. “That was the biggest difference, too many free points on my serve. I go down on my left side a lot on my serve, and it’s something I’m aware of. [But] it’s tough in the moment not to do it. I was just trying to commit to [the serve] and just stay calm.”

Martina Navratilova, working on commentary for Sky Sports, described Gauff’s continued struggles in an area of her game that has long come under scrutiny as an embarrassment.

“It’s one thing when you’re missing forehands or returns,” said Navratilova, an 18-time grand slam champion in singles. “The opponent’s in control, you’re reacting. But missing serves, when you’re in control – it’s embarrassing. Serve should be a plus, or at least neutral. It should not be a minus. It feeds off into the rest of your game.”

The accuracy of Navratilova’s analysis was reflected in the number of errors Gauff made off the forehand, an area that Navarro targeted from the outset. Time and again the world No 3 failed to get her weight through the shot, her extreme grip and tendency to fall off the ball leading to numerous shanks and overspun balls that nosedived into the net. Gauff’s coach, Brad Gilbert, urged her to go high to Navarro’s backhand, yet the tactic had little effect, even when the 20-year-old was able to implement it.

Navarro’s victory was about more than simply exploiting her opponent’s weaknesses, however. She neutralised Gauff’s serve with the quality and consistency of her returning, taking the ball early when she could, blocking it when occasion demanded. She absorbed and redirected Gauff’s power in the baseline exchanges, manipulating the ball intelligently and maintaining immaculate length. And down the stretch, as Gauff fought to retain the title, Navarro retained her composure and her aggression, relentlessly taking on her shots, playing to win rather than relying on the champion’s frailties.

“There’s a different energy playing on Ashe, playing someone like Coco,” said Navarro. “There’s a ton of energy and passion and emotion out there which I don’t show, but I definitely feel it. It wasn’t easy today. I wasn’t able to close it out in two sets, so just really wanted to take that moment on in the third set, just really aggressively and confidently.”

Navarro’s reward is a quarter-final appointment with Paula Badosa, whose renascent summer run continued with a 6-1, 6-2 victory over Wang Yafan of China. The 26-year-old Spaniard, a former world No 2 whose ranking plummeted after she suffered a stress fracture in her back last season, won her first title in more than two years last month in Washington before reaching the semi-finals in Cincinnati.

“A few months ago, I was thinking to quit this sport because I stopped believing in myself and my injury wasn’t responding,” said Badosa after reaching the second major quarter-final of her career. “To be back [at this level] is a dream come true.”

Elsewhere, Aryna Sabalenka moved into the last eight with a comfortable win over her former doubles partner Elise Mertens. The Belarusian second seed, defeated by Gauff in last year’s final, won 6-2, 6-4 and will next face Qinwen Zheng, the Olympic champion, who defeated Donna Vekic of Croatia 7-6 (7-2), 4-6, 6-2.

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The tennis equivalent of a hitwoman, Swiatek routinely metes out drubbings of the kind Pavlyuchenkova experienced at the Foro Italico. And when the former French Open finalist instantly fell a break behind, it was hard not to fear for her again. That feeling deepened in the fourth game, when Swiatek stabbed back a return on the stretch that, spinning violently, cleared the net before bouncing back into the Polish world No 1’s side of the court, leaving the dismayed Pavlyuchenkova flailing at air.

Despite that stroke of good fortune, however – “I would be giving too much credit to myself if I would say I had control over it,” Swiatek later admitted – the second meeting between the pair was, as the 6-4, 6-2 scoreline would suggest, markedly different to the first. Not least because if anyone was dodging bullets, it was Swiatek, who narrowly avoided being poleaxed at the net for the second time in a month.

In an echo of the controversial moment at the Paris Olympics when Danielle Collins drove a passing shot straight into Swiatek’s midriff, the top seed was forced into evasive action after chasing down a drop volley at the start of the second set. As the ball popped up invitingly, Pavluchenkova stepped in and slammed it straight at the startled Pole from point-blank range, before turning on her heel without a hint of apology. Swiatek managed to get her racket in the way, but she was evidently unimpressed, shooting Pavlyuchenkova a look that could have melted glaciers.

It proved to be a turning point. Up to that moment, the only difference between the players was a single break of serve. Pavlyuchenkova had left no stone unturned in her quest for an effective strategy, throwing herself into one of the most dangerous backhands in the game, nailing big serves and forehands, reminding all present that she has been a quarter-finalist at all four majors in doubles, as well as singles, with some fine touches at the net. But when Swiatek unleashed an unanswerable forehand on the next point, the impassioned cry of “Jazda!” that accompanied it – “Let’s go!” in Polish – spoke of a renewed determination. In short space, she reeled off 10 points in a row to establish what would prove an unassailable lead. All that remained was for Pavlyuchenkova to offer what looked like a belated apology at the net afterwards.

“For sure I was happy with the performance, because I felt like she’s a player who can play a really powerful first shot,” said Swiatek, without a trace of irony. “So I wanted to be ready for that, and I was. I’m happy that I was in control of the match.”

So she should be. Through to the second week for the fourth year in a row and yet to drop a set, Swiatek has improved steadily since her error-strewn opening-round win over Kamilla Rakhimova. The assured nature of her victory over the 25th-seeded Pavlyuchenkova – a former junior winner at Flushing Meadows enjoying a renascent summer after defeating Qinwen Zheng, the Olympic champion, en route to the Cincinnati quarter-finals – bodes well for her challenge for a second title in three years, which will continue on Monday against another Russian, Liudmila Samsonova. Swiatek has won all three of their previous meetings.

If further encouragement were needed for the world No 1, it came in the form of a pre-match visit from Serena Williams, the 23-time grand slam champion and another player who knew what it meant to be a stone-cold killer on court.

“She’s really nice and really positive,” said Swiatek. “I’m happy that she’s following tennis, and my games. She told me that she’s cheering for me, so it’s always nice to hear that from somebody like Serena.”

Swiatek enjoys listening to heavy rock as she makes her way into battle. While she may not be updating her pre-match playlist to include the surf-rock vibes of the Pulp Fiction soundtrack any time soon, she could do worse than take her cue from a line in the movie: “I wanna dance, I wanna win. I want that trophy, so dance good.”

So far, she is.

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Barely 24 hours after Carlos Alcaraz slumped to a shock defeat against Botic van de Zandschulp, Djokovic suffered his earliest loss at a major since 2017, when he fell to Denis Istomin in round two of the Australian Open. Given that Djokovic and Alcaraz contested a mentally and emotionally draining Olympic final earlier this month, it feels very much like a case of after the lord mayor’s show – all the more so when you consider that Lorenzo Musetti, the bronze medallist in Paris, was beaten in four sets by Brandon Nakashima earlier in the day.

On a night when he hit a career-high 14 double faults and 49 unforced errors in all, Djokovic looked bereft of inspiration and energy, much as Alcaraz had done the previous evening. Having scaled the heights at Roland Garros, where he staged a masterclass to end his long wait for the only significant omission from his trophy collection, the 37-year-old plumbed the depths at Flushing Meadows, afterwards offering a scathing assessment of his 6-4, 6-4, 2-6, 6-4 defeat to Popyrin, the Australian world No 28.

“Honestly, the way I felt, and the way I played from the beginning of this tournament, third round is a success,” said Djokovic, the defending champion, after failing to make the second week in New York for the first time since 2006.

“I played some of the worst tennis I’ve ever played. Serving, by far, the worst ever. If you play on a quick surface like this without the serve, without the ability to win free points there, very low first-serve percentage, many double faults, then you can’t win. You can’t win, especially against the guys who are in form like Alexei, who’s serving big and puts a lot of pressure on your service games. It was just an awful match from me.

“Obviously [the Olympics] had an effect. I spent a lot of energy winning the gold, and I did arrive to New York just not feeling fresh mentally and physically. But because it’s the US Open, I gave it a shot and I tried my best. I didn’t have any physical issues, I just felt out of gas – and you could see that with the way I played from the very beginning. From the first match, I just didn’t find myself at all on this court.”

While the result marked a seven-year low for Djokovic, it also brings up a seminal moment for the men’s game more broadly. This is the first season since 2002 that none of the “big three” of Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer have won a major and, while that moment had to come eventually, it has created a palpable sense of opportunity.

Perhaps this will be the moment when Alexander Zverev, beaten by Dominic Thiem in the final four years ago and seeded to meet Djokovic in the semi-finals this time around, finally makes his long-awaited grand slam breakthrough? Ditto Casper Ruud, pipped to the post by Alcaraz two summers ago, who will face home favourite Taylor Fritz for a place in the last eight. Hopes of an end to the American grand slam drought that dates back to Andy Roddick’s 2003 title run will centre too on Frances Tiafoe, a 4-6, 7-5, 6-7 (4-7), 6-4, 6-3 winner over Ben Shelton. And that is before we even get to Jannik Sinner, the world No 1 and Australian Open champion, or Daniil Medvedev, the 2021 champion, either of whom could maintain the status quo by claiming a second hard-court slam.

“Look, Alcaraz is out, I’m out, some big upsets,” said Djokovic. “The draw is opening up. Obviously Sinner is the main favourite, but then Tiafoe is there as well as American favourite Fritz. Zverev. You have great guys playing well, and [Andrey] Rublev, [Grigor] Dimitrov in this part of the draw. Anybody can take it.”

Djokovic included Popyrin in that appraisal – “He’s just beaten me, the defending champion, so he deserves credit for that and respect,” said the Serb – and certainly the 25-year-old’s trajectory this year has offered cause for optimism.

The Australian won a maiden Masters 1000 title in Montreal earlier this month, and extended Djokovic to a fourth set at both the Australian Open and Wimbledon. The belief Popyrin has taken from those performances was evident at the key moments, perhaps most notably when he fended off break points midway through the first set and early in the fourth. A slip at either juncture might have proved fatal, but Popyrin held firm for what was, on paper at least, the most significant win of his career – even if he insisted afterwards that his win in Montreal took precedence.

“For me, winning Montreal was way bigger than today, just because it’s a title and it’s a Masters 1000 title,” said Popyrin, who has never previously reached the last 16 of a major. “That felt unbelievable. Today was something that I kind of thought I could do, you know? Winning a Masters 1000 was not something that kind of crossed my head.

“But my two experiences against him earlier this year in the Australian Open and Wimbledon gave me the confidence to go out there tonight and believe that I could win – and actually do it and believe it. So when I did it, that kind of proved me right, proved what I was thinking right. It wasn’t something that was unbelievable, like Montreal.”

Be that as it may, most will find it hard to look at a US Open draw shorn of Djokovic and Alcaraz after just five days without feeling a sense of incredulity.

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That is to take nothing away from Botic van de Zandschulp, who delivered a performance of rare quality, poise and determination to consign the third seed and bookmakers’ favourite to a 6-1, 7-5, 6-4 defeat at Flushing Meadows. The 28-year-old Dutchman made a mockery of the fact that he had previously failed to win two consecutive main draw matches at tour level this year.

Yet Alcaraz was a shadow of the player who arrived in New York seeking to follow Rod Laver and Rafael Nadal into the record books by becoming only the third man in the open era to win at Roland Garros, Wimbledon and Flushing Meadows in the same calendar year. In truth, he has not resembled that player since losing the Olympic men’s singles final to Novak Djokovic. Between that defeat, which left the 21-year-old devastated, and his surprise opening-round loss to Gaël Monfils in Cincinnati less than a fortnight later, Alcaraz has lost three of his past four matches. While he rightly refused to take credit away from Van de Zandschulp, the Spaniard acknowledged that it has been a long summer.

“The tennis schedule is so tight,” said Alcaraz. “I’ve been playing a lot of matches lately with Roland Garros, Wimbledon, the Olympics. I took a little break after the Olympics. I thought it was enough. It was really helpful for me. Probably it wasn’t enough.

“I came here without as much energy as I thought I was going to come with. But I don’t want to use that as an excuse. It’s so tight. I’m a player who needs more days or more of a break coming into the big tournaments and important ones. I have to think about it and learn about it.”

An uncharacteristically flat display supported that analysis. While Alcaraz looked fresh enough physically, his shot selection and inconsistency offered clear evidence of mental fatigue. The warning signs were there as early as the Spaniard’s opening service game, where he went for a spectacular tweener at 30-30 when a deep defensive lob would potentially have allowed him to reset the point. Facing a break point, Alcaraz sent a regulation backhand long, one of 27 unforced errors he would make on a night when he frequently looked lost.

A signature feature of Alcaraz’s success has been his ability to adjust tactically, to solve problems on the fly by relying on his all-court virtuosity. For once, though, the magical shot-making that so often ignites crowds and creates irresistible momentum was largely absent. Instead, it was Van de Zandschulp who dictated with his forehand; who delighted with eye-catching defensive play; who dominated at the net. Alcaraz was effectively beaten at his own game, never more so than when Van de Zandschulp pulled off a stunning half-volley winner at full stretch midway through the third set. Alcaraz lacked the clarity of mind to find a solution.

“It was a fight against myself in my mind during the match,” said the Spaniard. “In tennis, you are playing against someone that wants the same as you: to win. You have to be as calm as you can, to think better in the match and try to do good things. Today, I was playing against the opponent as well as myself in my mind. A lot of emotions I couldn’t control. I was up in some points, then I’d lose some points and get down. It was a rollercoaster in my mind. It can’t be like that if I want to think about [winning] big things. I have to improve it.”

It is tempting to wonder whether the easiest way to do so would have been to take a leaf out of Djokovic’s book by resisting the temptation to play a warm-up event so soon after the emotional maelstrom of the Olympics. The manner in which Alcaraz obliterated a racket during his loss to Monfils in Cincinnati hardly spoke of a player ready to repeat his swashbuckling US Open title run of two years ago.

This was Alcaraz’s earliest defeat at a major since 2021, when he was bundled out of Wimbledon in round two by Daniil Medvedev. Yet, while it will go down as one of the biggest upsets of recent times at Flushing Meadows, a letdown at some point in this marathon summer was probably inevitable.

Consider the evidence. After returning from a forearm injury to win the French Open for the first time in early June, Alcaraz had just eight days to recover and adjust to grass before opening his short-lived title defence at Queen’s Club. He went on to become only the sixth man in the open era to complete the “Channel double” of Roland Garros and Wimbledon, but once again there was barely time to savour the achievement. Less than a fortnight later, Alcaraz was back at Roland Garros for the Olympics, where he played nine matches in nine days in singles and doubles. That left just 11 days to make the transition to hard courts in preparation for Cincinnati. It is a tribute to the efforts of his support team that he has managed to avoid injury.

While there is nothing new about the unforgiving demands of an Olympic summer, the cumulative toll of such a schedule – physically, mentally and emotionally – should not be underestimated. And while Alcaraz might be a victim of his own success, it is not only the elite who are affected by the sport’s jam-packed calendar. Mackenzie McDonald, the American world No 140, recently alluded to the difficulty of streamlining the structure of a sport with seven competing governing bodies, and the damage that the continuing failure to do so causes throughout the tennis food chain.

“The tours are not united enough to collaborate without egos and money getting involved,” McDonald told the Associated Press. “The players are absolutely getting crushed in so many ways – physically, mentally, financially. Having a normal life? We’re far from it. And then actually getting what we deserve, especially at the slams? It’s sad. I’ll put it that way.”

Iga Swiatek, the women’s world No 1, has complained that the concerns of players are going unheeded, while Holger Rune, who became another high-profile casualty when he was defeated by Brandon Nakashima in the opening round, has complained that the sport is “almost ongoing, 24/7”. When the sport’s most marketable young stars are falling so early – Rune came into the tournament carrying a knee injury that he felt unable to rest – questions need to be asked, recurring though the refrain may be.

Disillusioned by injuries and poor form, Van de Zandschulp nearly disembarked from the revolving carousel altogether after losing to Fabio Fognini in the opening round of this year’s French Open. It is not an option either man will be considering any time soon, but for Alcaraz a period of rest and recuperation seems needful.

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