One of the main home hopes at the US Open has suffered an early exit from the tournament after Madison Keys lost in the first round on Monday.
There were early signs the world No 6, who won the Australian Open in January, faced a tough match against Mexico’s Renata Zarazúa. The American won the first set, but only after taking a marathon tiebreak 12-10. Zarazúa won the second set on another tiebreak (7-3) before closing out the match by taking the final set 7-5.
It was an error-strewn performance from Keys, who reached the US Open final in 2017, and she sent down 14 double faults and only got 55% of her first serves in. Keys, whose left thigh was heavily taped, also hit 46 winners to her opponent’s five, but had 89 unforced errors.
“I feel like today, for the first time in a while, my nerves really got the better of me, and it kind of became a little bit paralysing,” said Keys. “I want to win, but just feeling like winning matters just way too much, and I just couldn’t quite separate myself from that. Then once you start playing badly, it just kind of all snowballs.”
Zarazúa, the world No 82, has a modest record on tour, has never advanced past the second round of a major and had a 0-6 record against Top 10 players coming into Monday’s match.
“I’m a little bit small in height, so coming in here, it was like: ‘Oh, my God. This is huge,’” said the 5ft 3in Zarazua. “When I retire, I’m going to be really happy about it, so I was like: ‘Just enjoy it.’”
There were other defeats for American players on Monday. Coleman Wong became the first player from Hong Kong to win a grand slam men’s singles match since the Open era began in 1968 when he defeated Aleksander Kovacevic in straight sets. The 21-year-old is ranked 173rd on the ATP Tour and was making his main draw Grand Slam debut. He had fallen short in qualifying at Flushing Meadows, the Australian Open and twice apiece at Wimbledon and the French Open.
Meanwhile, Sebastian Korda was forced to withdraw from his match against Britain’s Cameron Norrie while trailing 7-5, 6-4.
