Zheng and Andreeva advance as Thiem’s Grand Slam career over

Paris Olympics champion Zheng Qinwen rallied from a set down to beat Amanda Anisimova 4-6, 6-4, 6-2 on Monday and reach the second round of the US Open where she will next face Erika Andreeva, who held off Yuan Yue 6-3, 7-6(7).

Andreeva, at a career high of No.75 after reaching her first WTA quarter-final last week in Monterrey, saved one set point in the second-set tiebreak before hammering a forehand winner to convert her second match point.

“Obviously she’s hitting the ball really good today,” Zheng said of Anisimova, who is on the upswing since returning from a mental health break in January -- when she was ranked 373rd in the world. A run to the final at Toronto this month saw her return to the top 50 and gain a wild card invitation into the main draw.

“Every ball (from Anisimova) went inside in the beginning and I couldn’t do anything,” Zheng said. “More as the match goes I started to find my rhythm on hard court. Little by little I started to get into the rhythm.”

Zheng, who finished runner-up to Aryna Sabalenka at the Australian Open in January, has said she didn’t want the same let-down that followed that performance happen in the wake of her groundbreaking Paris Games triumph.

Asked on court about her run to gold -- which made her China’s first Olympic tennis singles champion -- she was gracious but already looking forward.

“I’m happy what I did in the past, but right now I just want to focus on what I do here,” said Zheng, who could face Sabalenka again in the quarter-finals.

Shelton downs Thiem: Dominic Thiem’s Grand Slam career came to an end at the US Open on Monday on the same Arthur Ashe court where he won his only major in 2020.

The injury-plagued former world number three went down to a 6-4, 6-2, 6-2 defeat to American 13th seed Ben Shelton, his eighth first round exit at his last 10 Slams.

Thiem had already announced his intention to retire from tennis on home ground in Vienna in October, giving up on his fruitless battle to fully recover from a persistent wrist injury.

When Thiem captured his first Slam by defeating Alexander Zverev from two sets down in the 2020 US Open final, it appeared that he was finally poised to challenge the likes of Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal at the highest level.

It also ended a sequence of three defeats in three Slam finals -- to Nadal at the 2018 and 2019 French Open and against Djokovic in five sets at the 2020 Australian Open.

However, his career went into a tailspin in the summer of 2021 when he suffered a wrist injury at the Mallorca ATP tournament.

Thiem suffered serious ligament damage and was forced to sit out the rest of 2021.

He played just two Slams in 2022 and his ranking fell to outside the top 100 for the first time in over a decade.

“I just want to say thanks for all the support. It’s been 10 years since I first played here, I had my greatest success on this court,” said Thiem whose 2020 triumph was witnessed by just a handful of people with the tournament played out at the height of the Covid pandemic.

Heading into the US Open, Thiem had won just two main draw matches all year, the most recent was at Estoril in the first week of April.

He needed a wildcard to play in New York with his ranking having slipped further to 210.

Shelton was full of praise for Thiem, the winner of 17 career titles and more than $30 million in prize money.

The pair exchanged warm words at the net before Shelton guided the crowd to applaud his rival.

Zverev beats Marterer: The fourth seed Alexander Zverev made a solid start to his campaign with a 6-2, 6-7(5), 6-3, 6-2 triumph against Maximilian Marterer. Zverev sent down 21 aces and converted six of 16 break points he earned to wrap a two-hour, 53-minute victory on Grandstand and set a second-round clash with Adam Walton or Alexandre Muller.

With victory against his fellow German Marterer, Zverev improved to 15-3 at the majors this year. The 27-year-old reached the semi-finals at the Australian Open, the championship match at Roland Garros, and the fourth round at Wimbledon, and his past history at the US Open suggests he is more than capable of forging a deep run this fortnight. Zverev reached his first Grand Slam final at the 2020 edition of the hard-court major before falling to Dominic Thiem.

Agencies