Emma Raducanu celebrates after defeating Belinda Bencic in the U.S. Open quarter-finals, in New York, on Sept. 8.Al Bello/Getty Images
British teenager Emma Raducanu produced yet another exquisite performance to become the first qualifier to reach the U.S. Open semi-finals on Wednesday, defeating Olympic champion Belinda Bencic 6-3 6-4 on Arthur Ashe Stadium.
Down an early break, the Briton recovered swiftly to win four straight games to close out the first set in which she had seven forehand winners and three aces.
Like Raducanu, Bencic had reached the last eight without dropping a set in Flushing Meadows but on Wednesday she struggled with her first serve and misfired a pair of costly double faults in the opening set.
Raducanu maintained her momentum in the second set, fending off three break points in the second game.
A frustrated Bencic handed Raducanu a break with a double fault in the fifth game and her frustration boiled over as the match progressed, with the Swiss smacking her racket to the ground.
Down 0-30 in her final two service games, Raducanu kept her nerve on both occasions and soaked up the cheers of the New York crowd after triumphing in a nine-shot rally on the final point.
“Playing Belinda – she’s such a great opponent,” Raducanu said. “Her ball speed definitely caught me off guard because she hits the ball so hard.”
The 18-year-old, who reached the Wimbledon fourth round on her Grand Slam debut just two months ago, has so far won all 16 sets she has played from qualifying through to the semi-finals.
She is the second teenager to make an impact in the women’s draw this week as 19-year-old Canadian Leylah Fernandez has also reached the last four.
“To have so many young players here doing so well just shows how strong the next generation is,” added Raducanu, who delighted a number of young fans by taking selfies with them before she walked off court.
“Everyone is on their trajectory. I’m just here taking care of what I can control, and it’s my own journey at the end of the day.”
Djokovic beats No. 6 seed Matteo Berrettini in four sets
Never fazed, rarely flummoxed, Novak Djokovic is so collected in best-of-five-set matches even when falling behind, as he has done repeatedly at the U.S. Open.
No opponent, or the prospect of what’s at stake, has been too much to handle. Not yet, anyway. And now he’s two wins away from the first calendar-year Grand Slam in men’s tennis since 1969, along with a men’s-record 21st major championship overall.
Djokovic ceded the opening set for the third consecutive match at Flushing Meadows – and ninth time at a major in 2021 – but again it didn’t matter, because he quickly corrected his strokes and beat No. 6 seed Matteo Berrettini 5-7, 6-2, 6-2, 6-3 in a quarter-final that began Wednesday night and concluded after midnight Thursday.
As he came back, his eyes squarely on his end goals, Djokovic found every angle, thwarted every big Berrettini shot and was so locked in he dove and dropped his racket during one exchange yet scrambled, rose and reinserted himself in the point. He lost it, but the message to his foe was unmistakable, essentially amounting to, “I will do whatever it takes.”
After 17 unforced errors in the first set, Djokovic made a total of 11 the rest of the way.
When Berrettini made one last stand, holding a break point while trailing 4-2 in the third set, Djokovic steadied himself. He let Berrettini put a backhand into the net, then conjured up a 121 mph ace and a forehand winner down the line to hold, then pointed his right index finger to his ear – one of many gestures asking the 20,299 in the Arthur Ashe Stadium stands for noise.
Four minutes later, that set was his. And 42 minutes later, the match was.
Djokovic is 26-0 in major tournaments this season, including trophies on the Australian Open’s hard courts in February, the French Open’s clay courts in June and Wimbledon’s grass courts in July. He beat Berrettini in the final at the All England Club.
Djokovic has added five victories on the U.S. Open’s hard courts and will face 2020 runner-up Alexander Zverev in Friday’s semi-finals. If Djokovic can win that match and Sunday’s final, he will join Don Budge (1938) and Rod Laver (1962 and 1969) as the only men to claim all four major tennis singles trophies in one season. (Three women have done it, most recently Steffi Graf in 1988; Serena Williams’ bid in 2015 ended in the U.S. Open semi-finals).
One more Slam title also will break the career mark Djokovic currently shares with rivals Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal.
Zverev goes into the semi-finals on a 16-match winning streak, including a 1-6, 6-3, 6-1 semi-final triumph against Djokovic en route to the gold medal at the Tokyo Olympics.
The No. 4-seeded Zverev, a 24-year-old German, advanced to the semi-finals in New York on Wednesday afternoon by beating Lloyd Harris 7-6 (6), 6-3, 6-4.