For years the US Tennis Association has been working on a plan to “Make American Tennis Great Again” and on Wednesday it all came together with US women completing a sweep at the US Open quarter-finals.
For the first time since 1981 when Tracy Austin, Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova and Barbara Potter waved the Stars and Stripes, Americans grabbed all four semi-finals berths, guaranteeing that one of them will hoist the trophy tomorrow.
For years critics have bemoaned the decline of the sport in the US, with ageing stalwarts Serena Williams and Venus Williams grimly hanging on until the next generation arrived.
Photo: AFP
The sweep might be the most promising sign yet that US tennis, at least on the women’s side, has turned the corner and the Williams sisters can rest easy knowing the torch has been passed.
It has been a long wait, but Madison Keys (22), Sloane Stephens (24) and Coco Vandeweghe (25) are now delivering on their promise and one of them could grab a first major if Venus Williams does not add a third US Open title to her collection.
Four players from the same country reaching the semi-finals is a rare feat.
Not since the 1985 Wimbledon championships when Navratilova, Evert, Zina Garrison and Kathy Rinaldi were the final four has any nation swept the semi-finals of a women’s Grand Slam.
“I can’t tell you how many times I have sat in this chair and had to hear how horrible tennis is in America,” Keys said following her 6-3, 6-3 win over Estonia’s Kaia Kanepi on Wednesday that completed the US sweep. “So this feels really good. The fact that there is going to be two all-American semi-finals, two people in the finals in Saturday, and Sam [Querrey] obviously had a great tournament. There is lots of young up-and-comers. I think there is a lot of good American tennis to come.”
No player was more surprised to find themselves in the last four than Stephens, who just six weeks ago was ranked outside the top 950 in the world.
Sidelined for almost a year after undergoing foot surgery, Stephens returned at Wimbledon and has been on a tear ever since, knocking off 11th seed Dominika Cibulkova, 30th seed Julia Goerges and 16th seed Anastasija Sevastova en route to the final four.
She is to play Venus.
The other semi sees Keys going up against Vandeweghe in a battle of big-hitters.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier