👋 Welcome back to The Daily Theory, our morning rundown to help you stay on top of your favorite sport. I’m Allen McDuffee, your guide to all things tennis.
Programming note: Today’s edition is a bit abbreviated due to travel. If you’ll be at the U.S. Open in the next few days, maybe we can meet up! Hit reply and tell me your plans.
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Let’s tennis!
Two Points
🎾 Mixed reviews: The U.S. Open mixed doubles event kicked off on Tuesday. As predicted, fans and players are having fun. But doubles aficionados were left feeling a bit disappointed. When you fill the draw with singles players who don’t know how to play doubles, it shows. Basic two up, two back formations. Nice groundstrokes without purpose. And the few doubles players who were allowed to play picked them apart.
- Noteworthy: Before the first match even took court, there was drama: Who was going to fill the draw after Jannik Sinner had to withdraw due to whatever was ailing him in the Cincinnati final? Answer: Danielle Collins and Christian Harrison. That turned out to be a great substitution because they took out Bencic and Zverev and then Townsend and Shelton without dropping a set.
🎾 Curious match: This is less about the match and more about one player. It’s Emma Navarro vs. Alycia Parks in Monterrey. This was not a planned stop for Navarro, who was originally set to play mixed doubles at the U.S. Open with Jannik Sinner. But a year’s worth of early round exits (save for winning the title in Merida in February) caused the former top ten player to regroup and grab some last-minute matches in Mexico. Let’s see if this week gets her what she needs or if it just reinforces the lackluster season it’s been thus far.
And, that’s game.
What They Said
Tactics in doubles are very important. There are many very strong players here, but we often play together, we also talk off the court, and this is important.We also play for all the doubles players who cannot compete at the mixed doubles tournament here. We try to do our best.
-Andrea Vavassori, after he and partner Sara Errani defeated Elena Rybakina and Taylor Fritz in the first round of the U.S. Open mixed doubles event.
On The Radar
Matches we’re monitoring today:
Monterrey - WTA 500 (Hard)
- Diana Shnaider vs. Kamilla Rakhimova (2nd round)
- Emma Navarro vs. Alycia Parks (2nd round)
- Donna Vekic vs. Elise Mertens (2nd round)
- Rebecca Sramkova vs. Leylah Fernandez (2nd round)
Cleveland - WTA 250 (Hard)
- Ann Li vs. Iva Jovic (2nd round)
- Katie Boulter vs. Viktorija Golubic (2nd round)
Winston-Salem - ATP 250 (Hard)
- Gabriel Diallo vs. Hamad Medjedovic (3rd round)
- Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard vs. Alexandre Muller (3rd round)
- Miomir Kecmanovic vs. Luciano Darderi (3rd round)
- Kamil Majchrzak vs. Sebastian Korda (3rd round)
- Yunchaokete Bu vs. Mariano Navone (3rd round)
Be sure to keep up with day two of U.S. Open qualifying.
📺 Learn how to watch today’s action over at Tennis Watchers.
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Read, Watch, Listen
- Sara Errani and Andrea Vavassori are running circles around the singles-player-centric mixed doubles field.
- At The Guardian, Tumaini Carayol gets into how (and why) Carlos Alcaraz and Emma Raducanu got crushed by Jessica Pegula and Jack Draper.
- Speaking of Emma Raducanu, she tells the BBC that Francis Roig is the best coach she’s ever worked with.
- Despite reuniting with his father as coach, Stefanos Tsitsipas is still struggling to find form, losing to Yunchaokete Bu in his first match as the top seed in Winston-Salem.
- Jack Draper hits the court for the first time in Vuori.
- Karen Khachanov sits for a U.S. Open Q&A with the ATP.
