US Open results

 

Congratulations to the US Open Champions  Carlos Alcaraz and Aryna Sabalenka.

There was no surprise in the line up for the men's singles final at the US Open.   Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz look like they will dominate men's tennis for a long time to come.  This was the third final slam final in a row where they faced off against each other and of course Sinner won the first slam final of the year as well.

The outcome might have been a little surprising though.  Sinner has been dominant on the hard courts in recent times and having pushed Alcaraz so close on the clay and having taken his Wimbledon crowd, one might have thought that Sinner would be in a strong position to win his third slam of the year.

Alcaraz was prepared for the challenge though. His team chose to skip Toronto and instead had an intensive training block entirely focusing on how they would beat Sinner on the hard courts and the results were evident not just in the final but throughout the tournament.  

Alcaraz was a more consistent and professional version of himself at the US Open and his serve in particular was far stronger than  ever allowing him to control all if his matches and not drop needless sets in the early rounds. 

Carlos didn't drop a single set on route to the final.  Even Novak, who deserves all the credit in the world for being the best of the rest at the grand old age of 38, could not lay a finger on him in the final. In the other semi final Sinner defeated Felix Auger Aliassime in 4 sets.  It was an excellent tournament for FAA which saw him score wins over Zverev and De Minaur and will give him confidence going forward.

The final itself wasn't the classic battle we might have hoped for.  Sinner did manage to get a set but didn't really mount a serious challenge and Alcaraz comfortably took his 2nd US Open title and remarkably his 6th Grand Slam title.

Going into this years US Open, there had been 9 different winners in the 10 years since Serena Williams won her 6 US Open title.  Only Naomi Osaka had won it twice in that time and nobody had defended their title since Serena.  Aryna Sablenka was reminded of that stat and assured the assembled press conference prior to the tournament, that she was going to change that trend.

And so she did!  Its been an interesting year for Aryna.  As her no 1 ranking indicated, she had been the best player on the WTA tour this year but she didn't have a slam title to show for it having been runner up at the Australian Open and the French Open.  

Sabalenka benefited from a walkover in the quarter final with Vondrousova pulling out after a tough 3 set win over the much fancied Rybakina.  She was given a tough challenge in the semi final with Jess Pegula taking the 1st set before Aryna struck back.  Remarkably Aryna won the 3rd set while only taking 4 points from Pegula's serve - it just so happened those 4 points were all in one game and that break proved to be enough.  

On the other half of the draw, there was sweet revenge for Amanda Anisimova over Iga Swiatek after that awful Wimbledon final where she was double bagelled by the Pole. That set up a semi final against Naomi Osaka who is finally founding the form that won her four grand slams a few years ago.  It was a terrific battle with Anisimova finally coming through winning the third set 6-3 after the two had shared tie breaks.

Anisimova back in a slam final at the first opportunity after her Wimbledon loss, was determined to put on a better show and she did manage to push Aryna all  the way but it was to end in disappointment once again with Aryna battling to a 6-3, 7-6 victory and thereby confirming her place as No 1 in the WTA rankings.  

And so to FTL.  With budgets for many teams around the 200m mark, its not too surprising that so many manager can field super teams at this stage of the season.   Sinner, Alcaraz, Swiatek, Sabalenka would find themselves in every team.  And because Jess Pegula had been on such a bad run of form, she was suddenly available as a dark horse pick - nearly everyone picked her and she delivered!

So ultimately it was down to one or two differentials to separate the teams in this FTL week.

Here is the final global leaderboard table for the US Open

 

Massive congrats to Mark (Top of the Popyrins) who won the game week in an incredibly tight contest with Tricia (Prepare for Czech mate).   Perhaps even more remarkably, Mark pulled off this feat, while having one of the finalists - Amanda Anisimova on the bench.  Lets just say his winning margin would have been a lot higher had he foreseen Amanada's win over Iga and actually picked her!

Lets take a look at the head to head between the two teams.

Both teams trusted in Djokovic to deliver and he definitely did.  You can't count him out just yet!  Tricia had a strong differential in Naomi Osaka while Mark had a sold return from De Minaur and chose to trust Pegula in his starting 8 rather than relying on the reduced points she would get as a DH Pick. Instead he chose Muchova as his female DH and she paid him back handsomely.  Tricia's main weakness other than the male DH was Coco Gauff who despite a 55 point return, really had a US Open to forget.