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Buse Beat Fery in the Winston-Salem Final. This Week They Sit on Opposite Benches at The O2

Steven Hodel
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Buse Beat Fery in the Winston-Salem Final. This Week They Sit on Opposite Benches at The O2

The last time Ignacio Buse and Arthur Fery shared a court, it was for a title. Buse beat Fery in the final at Winston-Salem, according to Laver Cup organizers. This week they will sit on opposite benches at The O2. Organizers named them on Monday as the alternates for Laver Cup London, Fery for Team Europe and Buse for Team World, four days before play begins on Friday.

Neither is guaranteed a match. Alternates are full members of the roster, according to the organizers: they take part in every team activity, practice with the squad and sit courtside on the bench, ready to step in if a teammate is forced to withdraw during the three days of competition.

Fery at home. Fery comes to The O2 from a Davis Cup weekend across town. He won a singles rubber on Saturday as Great Britain beat Ecuador 4-0 in London, according to the ATP Tour, and the sweep put Britain into the Final 8 in Bologna. He lives in Wimbledon, and the arena is one he knows from the stands.

“It’s really special for me. I grew up going to The O2, and now playing for Team Europe in the Laver Cup there is really special in front of all the British fans.”

His season turned at Wimbledon, where he reached the semifinals as a wildcard. The organizers said he was the fifth British man in the Open era to get that far and only the second wildcard to do it, after Goran Ivanisevic in 2001. He beat Flavio Cobolli on the way and lost to Alexander Zverev in the semifinal. Both are now his teammates. He started the year ranked 185th and is 36th now, the organizers said.

Fery played four seasons at Stanford before graduating in 2024, and he said college tennis had prepared him for the bench. “You’ve got to support each other and play for the team, not for yourself as much,” he said in the organizers’ announcement. “I’ll be ready to support my teammates from the bench if that’s what’s required from me.”

Buse, from qualifying to two titles. Buse, 22, made his tour debut only last year and is ranked 35th. He won the ATP 500 in Hamburg as a qualifier, beating Cobolli and Jakub Mensik along the way, and then took the ATP 250 in Winston-Salem, where the final against Fery made him the youngest champion in the tournament’s history, according to the organizers. He had committed to the University of Georgia for 2023 and turned professional instead.

“Being Peruvian and South American, I really love team competitions and being part of a team. I love that feeling of fighting together for something bigger than yourself.” He also named the man on his bench. “Having someone like Agassi as a coach is also an incredible opportunity, given all the experience he has,” Buse said.

The two rosters. Team Europe is unchanged since July. Captain Yannick Noah and vice-captain Tim Henman have Zverev, Carlos Alcaraz, Cobolli, Rafael Jodar, Mensik and Casper Ruud. Team World, under Andre Agassi and Patrick Rafter, is Taylor Fritz, Alex de Minaur, Learner Tien, Alexander Bublik, Brandon Nakashima and Francisco Cerundolo. Agassi’s six have changed twice since the US Open, with Cerundolo in for Tommy Paul and Nakashima in for Ben Shelton.

The alternate’s seat may matter more than usual this year, because some of the 12 arrive from a long weekend of Davis Cup. Zverev won both of his singles matches in Halle, finishing on Sunday with a 6-2, 6-4 win over Dino Prizmic that sent Germany to Bologna, according to the ATP Tour and the Associated Press. Four days later he is due on court in London.

When and where. The Laver Cup runs from 25 to 27 September at The O2, and Team World are the defending champions. The schedule, format and viewing guide are in our Laver Cup 2026 preview, and every past result is in our list of Laver Cup winners.

Zverev Didn’t Give Up a Break Point in Halle and the Bologna Eight Is Set

Steven Hodel
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Zverev Didn’t Give Up a Break Point in Halle and the Bologna Eight Is Set

Dino Prizmic did not reach break point on Sunday, and Matej Dodig had not reached one on Saturday. Alexander Zverev held serve through both of his singles rubbers at the Heristo Arena in Halle, beat Prizmic 6-2, 6-4 in 77 minutes on the indoor hard court, and sent Germany into the Davis Cup Final 8 with a 3-1 win over Croatia.

They were his first matches since he beat Ben Shelton in the US Open final a week earlier. Zverev won the opening rubber against Dodig on Saturday, and Croatia had the tie level before the day was out. On Sunday Kevin Krawietz and Tim Pütz put Germany back in front, beating Nikola Mektic and Mate Pavic, who won Olympic gold together in Tokyo, 7-5, 6-2. That left the clinching rubber to Zverev. Prizmic, ranked more than 100 places below him according to the Associated Press, did not get a single break point in any of Zverev’s service games.

Santiago. Spain had finished earlier in the day on outdoor clay at the Estadio Nacional, and they did it without Carlos Alcaraz. Jaume Munar and Pedro Martínez beat Alejandro Tabilo and Tomás Barrios Vera 6-0, 6-3 in the doubles for an unassailable 3-0 lead. Chile did not win a game until the second set. Spain had led 2-0 after Saturday’s singles, one of which Rafael Jódar won.

London. Great Britain were also 3-0 up after the doubles at the Copper Box. Toby Samuel and Arthur Fery won the singles against Ecuador on Saturday, and on Sunday Henry Patten and Neal Skupski beat Gonzalo Escobar and Diego Hidalgo 6-3, 6-4.

The field. Those three results complete the eight. Italy, the host and three-time defending champion, will be joined by Austria, Canada, Czechia, Germany, Great Britain, South Korea and Spain at the SuperTennis Arena at BolognaFiere from 24 to 29 November. Each tie is played in a single day, two singles and then a doubles if it is needed. The quarterfinals run from Tuesday 24 to Thursday 26 November and the final is on Sunday 29 November.

What comes next. The quarterfinal pairings come from a draw that has not yet been announced. Whether Alcaraz plays for Spain in November has not been announced.

Chile and Croatia. Both drop to the first round of Qualifiers in 2027, with the other five beaten nations. Tabilo does not get long to think about it. He is the third seed and defending champion at the Chengdu Open, an ATP 250 that starts on Wednesday.

The rest of the round. Canada came through against France after Felix Auger-Aliassime’s comeback on Saturday, Czechia beat the United States when Jiri Lehecka took his fourth match point, South Korea beat India to reach the last eight for the first time, and Austria beat Belgium. How the competition is structured is in how the Davis Cup works, the full round is in our Final 8 guide, and every past champion is in our Davis Cup winners list.

Alejandro Tabilo Profile — The Lefty Who Beat Djokovic Twice on Clay

Steven Hodel
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Alejandro Tabilo Profile — The Lefty Who Beat Djokovic Twice on Clay

Alejandro Tabilo has played Novak Djokovic twice, both times on clay, and won both in straight sets. In Rome in 2024 he dropped five games. In the second round at Monte-Carlo in April 2025 he won 6-3, 6-4, and the ATP Tour reported that Djokovic could not find his range from the baseline or cope with Tabilo’s flat ball-striking. He became only the ninth player to open his head-to-head with Djokovic 2-0, and joined Jiri Vesely as a left-hander with a 2-0 record against him.

The Monte-Carlo win came with a wrist he had been taping since Miami. He lost his next match, to Grigor Dimitrov, and then had it scanned. “I did an MRI and it was almost a stress fracture,” he told ATPTour.com later that year. “So it was a pretty good win.”

Toronto, Florida, Santiago

Tabilo was born in Toronto to Chilean parents, Ricardo and María, who ran a cleaning company, according to his Laver Cup biography. Known as Jano, he followed his older brother Sebastián into tennis, left home at 13 to train in Florida, and grew up idolising Rafael Nadal, a fellow left-hander. He represented Canada throughout his junior career, according to his ATP biography, and moved to Santiago permanently at 19 to play for Chile.

From qualifying to No. 19

He started 2024 ranked 85th and came through qualifying to win his first ATP Tour title in Auckland, the first hard-court title by a Chilean since Fernando Gonzalez in 2007. He reached the final at home in Santiago, then beat Djokovic in Rome and went on to the semifinals, where he took Alexander Zverev, the eventual champion, to three sets. In June he won Mallorca, the first grass-court title by a Chilean man in the Open Era, and followed it with his first Grand Slam third round at Wimbledon, where he beat Flavio Cobolli in five sets. The two titles took him to a career-high No. 19. That September he played the Laver Cup in Berlin, the first Chilean to appear in it.

Playing hurt and Chengdu

The wrist was one of several injuries in 2025. He told ATPTour.com he tore a muscle in his abdomen after Roland Garros and twisted an ankle in Winston-Salem, and that he has a habit of playing through things he should report. “The problem with me, I really like to just dig it out and not tell anybody about my pain,” he said. He recalled training for several days at Roland Garros one year with what turned out to be appendicitis.

He finished 2025 with a third title. At the Chengdu Open in September he came through qualifying and beat Lorenzo Musetti, then ranked ninth, 6-3, 2-6, 7-6(5) in the final after saving two championship points.

A first second week, in Paris

In 2026 he reached the ATP 500 final in Rio de Janeiro in February and won the Challenger 175 in Aix-en-Provence in May, according to the ATP Tour. At Roland Garros he reached the fourth round of a major for the first time, beating the 17-year-old French wild card Moise Kouame in four sets and three hours 40 minutes on Court Suzanne-Lenglen. He was the fourth Chilean man since 2000 to reach the last 16 in Paris, after Gonzalez, Cristian Garin and Nicolas Jarry, according to the tournament. Afterwards he said it was the first time he had played someone more than a decade younger than him. Felix Auger-Aliassime beat him 6-3, 7-5, 6-1 on Court Philippe-Chatrier in the fourth round.

Playing style

Tabilo is a left-hander with a two-handed backhand and a flat ball, His tour titles have come on hard courts in Auckland and Chengdu and on grass in Mallorca, and his deepest Grand Slam run came on clay in Paris. He also won six straight-set matches, five of them against Argentines, on his way to his first tour-level final as a qualifier in Cordoba in 2022, according to his ATP biography.

Grand Slam best results

  • Roland Garros: fourth round (2026)
  • Wimbledon: third round (2024)
  • Australian Open: second round (2020, on his Grand Slam main-draw debut, after a five-set win over Daniel Elahi Galan)

Season snapshot — 21 September 2026

Ranked 32nd. This week he defends his Chengdu title as the third seed, with a bye into the second round and a first match against Shang Juncheng, the 2024 champion, or Adrian Mannarino. He arrives from Santiago, where on Sunday he and Tomás Barrios Vera lost the Davis Cup doubles to Jaume Munar and Pedro Martínez 6-0, 6-3, the rubber that put Spain into the Final 8. Where Chengdu sits in the autumn calendar is in the Asian swing explained.

This snapshot is dated and will change. The career record above does not.

Royer’s Road Back to the Hangzhou Final Runs Through Medvedev

Steven Hodel
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Royer’s Road Back to the Hangzhou Final Runs Through Medvedev

Valentin Royer lost last year’s Hangzhou final to Alexander Bublik 7-6(4), 7-6(4). Bublik is not in this year’s draw, and Royer’s path runs straight into the top seed. If he beats Adam Walton in the first round, his next opponent is Daniil Medvedev, who has a bye.

The draws for the AITO Hangzhou Open and the Chengdu Open were made on Monday. Both are ATP 250 events on hard courts, both run from Wednesday 23 to Tuesday 29 September, and in both the top four seeds go straight into the second round of a 28-player draw. Qualifying is on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Hangzhou. Medvedev is seeded first at No. 6 in the ATP rankings, ahead of Andrey Rublev (25), Tomas Martin Etcheverry (30) and Quentin Halys (49). Rublev opens against Rinky Hijikata or a qualifier, Etcheverry against Aleksandar Vukic or Kyrian Jacquet, and Halys against Roman Safiullin or a qualifier. Adolfo Daniel Vallejo, Fabian Marozsan, Jaime Faria and Kamil Majchrzak are seeded fifth to eighth.

Three Chinese players are in Medvedev’s half of the draw. Zhang Zhizhen, a wild card and the runner-up here in 2024, plays Coleman Wong of Hong Kong in the first round, with the winner in Medvedev’s quarter. Cui Jie, also a wild card, opens against Vallejo. Bu Yunchaokete, the last direct acceptance at No. 124, plays the American wild card Michael Zheng. The singles final is on Tuesday 29 September, not before 7:30 p.m. local time.

Chengdu. Valentin Vacherot is the top seed at No. 19, a year after he came through qualifying to win the Shanghai Masters, beating his cousin Arthur Rinderknech in the final. He opens against Aleksandar Kovacevic or a qualifier. Alejandro Davidovich Fokina is seeded second and meets Juan Manuel Cerundolo or the Chinese wild card Zhou Yi. Botic van de Zandschulp, the fourth seed, plays Miomir Kecmanovic or a qualifier.

The third seed is the defending champion, Alejandro Tabilo, who saved two championship points against Lorenzo Musetti in last year’s final and won 6-3, 2-6, 7-6(5). Tabilo was playing doubles for Chile against Spain in Santiago on Sunday, and his first match in Chengdu is against the winner of Shang Juncheng and Adrian Mannarino. Shang, a wild card, won the title in 2024.

Elsewhere, fifth seed Hubert Hurkacz plays Aleksandr Shevchenko, the last direct acceptance at No. 97, seventh seed Denis Shapovalov plays Tallon Griekspoor, and eighth seed Sebastian Baez plays Jenson Brooksby. Lorenzo Sonego meets James Duckworth, and sixth seed Nuno Borges meets Camilo Ugo Carabelli.

What is at stake. Each champion takes 250 ranking points. The winner’s cheque is $184,085 in Chengdu and $158,065 in Hangzhou. The ATP 500 events that follow are in Tokyo and Beijing, and the full sequence is in the Asian swing explained. For where the seeds stand in the chase for the last places in Turin, see the Race to Turin.

Wuhan Open Guide — Dates, Draw, Points, Past Champions

Steven Hodel
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Wuhan Open Guide — Dates, Draw, Points, Past Champions

The Wuhan Open is the last WTA 1000 of the women’s season. It follows the China Open in Beijing on the Asian swing, is played on outdoor hard courts, and comes three weeks before the WTA Finals, which makes it one of the last big chances to earn points for Indian Wells in November. This guide covers how the tournament works, what players earn and who has won it, with the current year’s details in a dated section at the end.

The venue and the history

The tournament is played at the Optics Valley International Tennis Centre in Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province and the home city of two-time Grand Slam champion Li Na. It joined the WTA calendar in 2014, taking over the Premier 5 slot that had belonged to the Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo. It was not held from 2020 to 2023 because of the pandemic, and it came back in 2024 as a WTA 1000.

How the draw works

Wuhan is a one-week WTA 1000 with a 56-player singles draw and a 28-team doubles draw. That is smaller than the two-week, 96-player 1000s in Beijing, Indian Wells and Miami. In a 56-player draw the top eight seeds receive first-round byes, so the leading players start in the second round. The champion earns 1,000 ranking points, the same as at every WTA 1000.

Prize money and points (2026)

Round reachedRanking pointsPrize money (USD)
Champion1,000$665,000
Finalist650$385,001
Semifinal390$197,000
Quarterfinal215$98,500
Third round120$49,250
Second round65$26,000
First round10$18,300

Figures are from the WTA’s 2026 Asian swing guide. For how these amounts are set, see how prize money works in professional tennis.

Where it sits in the season

The week after Wuhan, the WTA moves on to Ningbo, a WTA 500, and Osaka. Tokyo’s Pan Pacific Open, the last WTA 500 of the year, follows at the end of October. The eight singles qualifiers for the WTA Finals are decided by the season-long race, and Wuhan’s 1,000 points are the last 1000-level points on offer before the cut-off. How the race works is explained in our guide to the WTA Race to the Finals, and the full autumn calendar is in the Asian swing explained.

Past champions

Aryna Sabalenka has won Wuhan three times, in 2018, 2019 and 2024, more than anyone else. Petra Kvitova won the first edition in 2014 and won again in 2016. Venus Williams won in 2015 and Caroline Garcia in 2017. Coco Gauff is the defending champion, having beaten Jessica Pegula 6-4, 7-5 in an all-American final in 2025.

How to watch

WTA broadcast rights are sold by region, and the WTA publishes the current rights holder for each country on its where-to-watch page. Wuhan is on China Standard Time, GMT+8, 12 hours ahead of New York in mid-October, so day sessions fall overnight in the Americas and evening matches land in the European morning.

Season Snapshot: 2026

Updated 8 October 2026. The 2026 Dongfeng Voyah Wuhan Open runs from 12 to 18 October. According to the WTA, the singles final is scheduled for Sunday 18 October, not before 6:30 p.m. local time, with the doubles final at 4 p.m. It starts the day after the China Open finishes in Beijing. Gauff, the defending champion, has withdrawn, as have world No. 1 Elena Rybakina, Naomi Osaka, Amanda Anisimova and Emma Navarro, according to the WTA. The tracker below is updated as the entry list and draw change. The WTA Finals follow at Indian Wells from 8 to 15 November.

Wuhan Open withdrawals

WTA 1000, outdoor hard. Wuhan, China, Oct 12 to Oct 18, 2026
13out5replaced
Oleksandra OliynykovaUKR, No. 51
Replacement not yet confirmed
Right ankle injury. Main draw, Oct 12. Source
Zheng QinwenCHN, No. 23
Replacement not yet confirmed
Right shoulder injury. Main draw, Oct 12. Source
Anna KalinskayaNo. 21
Replacement not yet confirmed
Illness. Main draw, Oct 12. Source
Linda NoskovaCZE, No. 8
Replacement not yet confirmed
Left calf injury. Main draw, Oct 12. Source
Mirra AndreevaNo. 3
Replacement not yet confirmed
Change of schedule. Main draw, Oct 12. Source
Karolina PliskovaCZE
Replacement not yet confirmed
Back injury. Entry list, Oct 8. Source
Anastasia Potapova
Replacement not yet confirmed
Not stated. Entry list, Oct 8. Source
Madison KeysUSA
Replacement not yet confirmed
Abdominal injury. Entry list, Oct 8. Source
Naomi OsakaJPN
Zheng QinwenNot yet known
Change of schedule. Entry list, Oct 7. Source
Coco GauffUSA, No. 4
Next alternate entered
Fatigue. Entry list, Oct 7. Source
Elena RybakinaKAZ, No. 1
Next alternate entered
Foot injury. Entry list, Oct 4. Source
Emma NavarroUSA
Next alternate entered
Health, season over. Entry list, Sep 30. Source
Amanda AnisimovaUSA
Next alternate entered
Wrist injury, season over. Entry list, Sep 28. Source
Updated Oct 12, 10:11 am EDT Tracker by Global Tennis News

Jovic Didn’t Face a Break Point and Guadalajara Is Hers Again

Steven Hodel
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Jovic Didn’t Face a Break Point and Guadalajara Is Hers Again

For eight games of the final neither woman had a break point. Then, at 4-4, Iva Jovic got to 30-40 on Peyton Stearns’ serve and took the only chance of the set. She served it out, broke in the first game of the second set and again at 4-2, and beat her fellow American 6-4, 6-2 on Saturday night to defend her Guadalajara Open title.

By the time the sombrero went on her head for the trophy ceremony it was raining, and she kept her speech short. “Okay, I am going to make this fast,” she told the crowd. “Stay dry.” Jovic, 18, did not face a break point in the final and converted three of her five. She closed it on her own serve at 5-2, and needed three match points to do it, finishing with a backhand winner down the line.

It is the second title of her career, and both have come here. A year ago, unseeded and 17, she won her first in Guadalajara, and the WTA noted that she was the youngest champion of the 2025 season. This time she arrived as the No. 2 seed and the defending champion, and did not drop a set in four matches, beating Zeynep Sonmez, Magdalena Frech, Cristina Bucsa and Stearns.

“There have been a lot of different things to deal with, to adjust to, and I’ve just been having a positive mindset through it all,” she said after her 6-4, 6-1 semifinal win over Bucsa. “There were so many ups and downs, but I was able to just hold firm on my serve.”

Stearns’ week The draw opened up when Liudmila Samsonova, the No. 8 seed, beat top seed Marta Kostyuk in the quarterfinals. Stearns, unseeded, then came from a double break down in the first set to beat Samsonova 7-6(7), 6-2 in the semifinals. “I think I started a little tense on my heels and she came out swinging,” Stearns said. It was the first meeting between the two, and Stearns, 24, was chasing a third career title after Rabat in 2024 and the ATX Open in Austin in February. It was the second all-American final on the WTA Tour this year.

The season Jovic came into the week ranked 16th, with a career high of No. 14 from late August. Guadalajara follows a season in which she reached the Australian Open quarterfinals, where Aryna Sabalenka beat her, and the fourth round at Wimbledon and the US Open, where Coco Gauff beat her 6-1, 6-4.

The 500 points put her in the conversation for the WTA Finals at Indian Wells in November, eight places decided by the season-long race. One report has her 11th in the race after Guadalajara. The last big points of the year come on the Asian swing, starting with the 96-player WTA 1000 at the China Open in Beijing from the end of this month. How qualification works is explained in our guide to the WTA Race to the Finals.

Japan Open Guide — Tokyo ATP 500 Dates, Draw, Past Champions

Steven Hodel
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Japan Open Guide — Tokyo ATP 500 Dates, Draw, Past Champions

The Japan Open in Tokyo is one of two ATP 500s in the first week of October, played at the same time as the China Open in Beijing and finishing the week before the Shanghai Masters. It is a men’s event on outdoor hard courts at the Ariake Coliseum. This guide covers how the tournament works, what players earn and who has won it, with the current year’s field in a dated section at the end.

The venue

The tournament is played at the Ariake Coliseum in the Ariake Tennis Forest Park, in Tokyo’s Koto ward on the waterfront. The Coliseum, which has a retractable roof, was the main tennis stadium for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, held in 2021. Its full name for sponsorship purposes is the Kinoshita Group Japan Open Tennis Championships.

Not to be confused with

Japan has three tour events in the autumn and their names overlap. The Tokyo ATP 500 in this guide is men only. The WTA 250 in Osaka, held in the second half of October, also carries the Kinoshita Group Japan Open name. The Toray Pan Pacific Open is a separate WTA 500 in Tokyo at the end of October and the start of November. All three are listed week by week in the Asian swing explained.

Format and points

Tokyo is a one-week ATP 500 with a 32-player singles draw and a 16-team doubles draw, preceded by two days of qualifying. The champion earns 500 ranking points, the finalist 330, the semifinalists 200 and the quarterfinalists 100. Unusually, the main draw starts on a Wednesday and the final is played on a Tuesday, which lines up with the Beijing ATP 500 and leaves players a short turnaround before Shanghai. The ATP publishes the round-by-round prize money breakdown closer to the event. For how the figures are set, see how prize money works in professional tennis.

Players choose between Tokyo and Beijing in the same week. Both lead into the Shanghai Masters, and points from both count towards the Race to Turin.

Past champions

Carlos Alcaraz won the title on his debut in 2025, beating Taylor Fritz 6-4, 6-4 in the final. Arthur Fils won in 2024, and Ben Shelton took his first ATP title here in 2023, beating Aslan Karatsev 7-5, 6-1 in the final. Fritz won in 2022, the first edition after two cancelled years during the pandemic. Novak Djokovic won in 2019, and Kei Nishikori won his home event in 2012 and 2014.

How to watch

Matches stream on Tennis TV, the ATP’s own subscription service, and local broadcasters carry the event in many countries. Tokyo is on Japan Standard Time, GMT+9, 13 hours ahead of New York in early October, so most of the play falls overnight in the Americas and the late matches land in the European morning.

Season Snapshot: 2026

Update — Oct. 2, 2026: Three players have withdrawn from the entry list. Shelton pulled out on Sept. 25, saying the US Open and Davis Cup had taken a toll on his body, and Alex Michelsen took his place. Joao Fonseca withdrew from the Asian swing and was replaced by Luca Van Assche. Lorenzo Musetti withdrew on Sept. 30, hours before his opening match, with a small fracture in the ring finger of his right hand sustained in practice; lucky loser Jaime Faria replaced him.

Alcaraz is the top seed, followed by Frances Tiafoe, Fritz, Rafael Jodar, Nakashima, Ruud, Tommy Paul and Valentin Vacherot, and he opens his defense against Michelsen. Kei Nishikori, playing the last tournament of his career on a wild card, lost to Tiafoe 6-4, 6-4 in the first round. The full bracket is in our Japan Open draw preview.

Updated 20 September 2026. According to the tournament, qualifying is on Monday 28 and Tuesday 29 September and the main draw runs from Wednesday 30 September to Tuesday 6 October.

The entry list published by the ATP on 3 September is headed by Alcaraz, the defending champion, with Shelton, Fritz, Frances Tiafoe and Rafael Jodar behind him. Lorenzo Musetti, Brandon Nakashima, Jiri Lehecka, Casper Ruud and Tommy Paul are also entered, along with Joao Fonseca and Holger Rune. Alcaraz, Fritz, Jodar, Nakashima and Ruud play the Laver Cup in London the weekend before. Final seedings and withdrawals are confirmed when the draw is made.

Learner Tien Profile — The Lefty Who Beat Medvedev at Two Australian Opens

Steven Hodel
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Learner Tien Profile — The Lefty Who Beat Medvedev at Two Australian Opens

“One extra ball coming back, one extra ball,” Karen Khachanov said after needing three hours and 50 minutes and five sets to get past Learner Tien in the fourth round of the 2026 US Open. “He loves to play that defense outside the court, that’s why it makes it extremely tough.” That is the scouting report most opponents arrive at. Tien is a left-hander from Irvine, California, who makes people hit more balls than they want to, and in two seasons it has taken him from outside the top 200 to the top 15.

Irvine, the juniors and Kalamazoo

Tien was born on 2 December 2005 in Irvine. His parents played recreationally and he learned the game on community courts near the family home, coached mainly by his father, Khuong, until he entered the USTA’s player development programme at around 10 or 11, according to his ATP biography. His mother, Huyen, is a school teacher, and he has an older sister, Justice.

He reached No. 4 in the junior rankings and played two boys’ singles finals at the majors in 2023, losing to Alexander Blockx at the Australian Open and to Joao Fonseca at the US Open. With Cooper Williams he won the 2023 Australian Open boys’ doubles, beating Blockx and Fonseca in the final. He won the USTA Boys’ 18s National Championships in Kalamazoo in 2022 and 2023, each title carrying a US Open main-draw wild card, and spent one semester at the University of Southern California before turning professional in the summer of 2023.

Twenty-eight in a row

The breakout came in the summer of 2024, when Tien won 28 consecutive matches between May and July. The streak took in four ITF titles in Southern California and his first Challenger title, at Bloomfield Hills in Michigan. He won a third wild card into the US Open that August by winning the US Open Wild Card Challenge, and entered the top 200 the same month. He ended the year in the final of the Next Gen ATP Finals, where Fonseca beat him.

Medvedev at 3 a.m., and a first title

At the 2025 Australian Open Tien came through qualifying and beat fifth seed Daniil Medvedev in the second round in a five-set match that finished around 3 a.m. in Melbourne. The ATP says it made him the youngest man to beat a top-five player at the event since its rankings began in 1973. He reached the fourth round, where Lorenzo Sonego beat him, and entered the top 100. Six weeks later in Acapulco, again as a qualifier, he beat world No. 2 Alexander Zverev, the biggest win of his career by ranking. On grass in Mallorca that June he beat Ben Shelton, then ranked 10th.

He reached his first ATP final at the China Open in Beijing in September 2025, losing to Jannik Sinner, and won his first title in Metz in November, beating Cameron Norrie in the final. The ATP says he was the youngest American to win a tour title since Andy Roddick in Houston in 2002. In December he won the Next Gen ATP Finals in Jeddah, beating Blockx in the final, the first left-hander to win the event.

2026: Melbourne, Geneva and Montreal

Tien beat Medvedev again at the 2026 Australian Open, this time in straight sets in the fourth round, to reach his first Grand Slam quarterfinal, where Zverev beat him. In March he beat Shelton to reach his first Masters 1000 quarterfinal, at Indian Wells. On clay he reached the fourth round in Rome and then won the Geneva Open, beating Alexander Bublik in the semifinals and Mariano Navone 3-6, 6-3, 7-5 in the final. The ATP noted he was the youngest American man to win a tour-level title on European clay since his coach, Michael Chang, won Roland Garros in 1989.

In August he reached the semifinals of the Masters 1000 in Montreal, the youngest American Masters semifinalist since Roddick in 2002, according to the ATP, and rose to a career-high No. 12. At the US Open he beat Jakub Mensik 6-3, 1-6, 6-7(2), 6-3, 6-4 in a third-round match on Louis Armstrong Stadium that ran past 1 a.m., and lost the fourth-round match to Khachanov 7-5, 4-6, 6-7(6), 6-1, 6-4.

Playing style

Tien is left-handed with a two-handed backhand, which he names as his best shot, and hard courts are his preferred surface. He is listed at 1.80m. Chang, the 1989 Roland Garros champion, is the most visible name in his coaching team. The ATP lists among his good friends on tour fellow American Alex Michelsen.

Grand Slam record

  • Australian Open: quarterfinals (2026)
  • Roland Garros: third round (2026)
  • Wimbledon: second round (2026)
  • US Open: fourth round (2026)

Season snapshot — 20 September 2026

Ranked No. 13, with a career high of No. 12, reached in August 2026. Career ATP singles titles: 2 (Metz 2025, Geneva 2026), plus the 2025 Next Gen ATP Finals. Coached by Michael Chang.

Tien made his Davis Cup debut for the United States in Prague last weekend. He beat Mensik 6-2, 6-4 in the opening rubber, then lost the deciding fifth rubber to Jiri Lehecka 6-3, 7-5 as Czechia won the tie 3-2 and took the place in the Final 8 in Bologna. He played for Team World at the Laver Cup at The O2 in London, where Alexander Zverev beat him 7-6(3), 6-3 in the match that clinched Team Europe’s 13-5 win, after Tien had held a set point in the first set, according to the ATP Tour. Next come the Asian swing and the Shanghai Masters.

This snapshot is dated and will change. The career record above does not.

Lehecka Needed Four Match Points as Czechia Beats America Again

Steven Hodel
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Lehecka Needed Four Match Points as Czechia Beats America Again

Jiri Lehecka needed four match points to finish it since Learner Tien saved the first at 6-5, 40-30 with a 23-shot rally that ended with Lehecka netting a return. Lehecka set up the second with an overhead and then double-faulted it away. Tien saved the third with a forehand pass. On the fourth, Lehecka hit a forehand winner off the third ball of the point, dropped to his knees, and Czechia had beaten the United States 3-2 to reach the Davis Cup Final 8.

Lehecka beat Tien 6-3, 7-5 in the fifth rubber at the O2 Arena on Saturday night, his second win of the weekend after Friday’s 6-4, 6-4 defeat of Ben Shelton. For the second September running the Czechs trailed the United States 2-1 going into the last two singles and won both. A year ago in Delray Beach it was Jakub Mensik who beat Frances Tiafoe 6-1, 6-4 in the decider.

The first set turned in its seventh and eighth games. Lehecka had broken for 2-0 when Tien netted a drop shot, and Tien broke straight back with a backhand pass down the line. At 3-3 the American had two break points and Lehecka saved both. In the next game Tien double-faulted and put a forehand into the net, Lehecka had the break for 5-3, and he served out the set from 30-30. Tien led the second set 3-0 and could not hold it. Lehecka broke him at 5-5 and served for the tie.

“The wins in Davis Cup are always a little bit different because this is a team competition,” Lehecka said afterwards. “I must say it has been a great week. But, most importantly, we made it through as a team. Without Jakub winning against Ben, I would not have the chance to play the final match.”

Mensik’s turnaround Twenty-four hours earlier Mensik had been beaten 6-2, 6-4 by Tien in 67 minutes, the American’s third win in three meetings with him. Against Shelton on Saturday, with the United States one match from Bologna, he lost the first set 7-5, reached set point in the second at the same stage he had in the first, and this time converted it with a forehand. He closed out the third on his second match point in a tight final game and won 5-7, 6-4, 6-3.

“Yesterday wasn’t my day,” Mensik said. “When I saw Jiri play and the atmosphere and energy he brought, it’s something I was missing yesterday.” The Americans had gone ahead in the doubles that opened the day. Christian Harrison and Austin Krajicek saved four match points to beat Adam Pavlasek and Patrik Rikl 5-7, 6-3, 7-6(8), which left Shelton one win from sending the United States to Bologna.

Instead it was his third defeat in eight days, after the US Open final against Alexander Zverev and Friday’s loss to Lehecka. Shelton had pulled out of next weekend’s Laver Cup to play this tie, and Brandon Nakashima took his place on Team World. “No regrets. There’s zero regrets,” United States captain Bob Bryan said. “We brought the best team possible. Ben’s setting an example, win or lose, he’s setting an example to the younger generation on what it means to prioritize playing for your country.”

Bologna Czechia join South Korea, Austria and Canada, who also qualified on Saturday, and Italy, the host nation and three-time defending champion, at the Final 8 in Bologna from 24 to 29 November. The last three places are settled on Sunday: Germany and Croatia are level 1-1 in Halle, Great Britain lead Ecuador 2-0 in London, and Spain lead Chile 2-0 on clay in Santiago. The quarterfinal draw has not been scheduled. Our Final 8 tracker has the full field as it stands.

The United States, champions a record 32 times, have not won the Davis Cup since 2007 and will start 2027 in the Qualifiers first round. Czechia, who won the competition in 2012 and 2013 under the old format, played in front of more than 13,000 spectators on each day in Prague. For how the qualifying rounds feed into Bologna, see how the Davis Cup works and for every champion since 1968, our list of Davis Cup winners. The draw and venue for this tie are in our Prague preview and there is more on the Czech No. 1 in our Jiri Lehecka profile.

Auger-Aliassime Loses in Doubles but Comes Back 35 Minutes Later and Takes Canada to Bologna

Steven Hodel
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Auger-Aliassime Loses in Doubles but Comes Back 35 Minutes Later and Takes Canada to Bologna

Arthur Rinderknech won the first three points of the second-set tiebreak and four of the first six, and at that point France were a set away from a deciding rubber. Felix Auger-Aliassime took five of the next six points. In the third set the ninth game decided it, as it had in the first, only this time the break went to the Canadian. He held on his first match point to beat Rinderknech 4-6, 7-6(5), 6-4 and send Canada into the Davis Cup Final 8 with a 3-1 win at the Videotron Centre on Saturday.

It was Auger-Aliassime’s third match in two days, and it started, according to The Canadian Press, 35 minutes after he walked off court from a doubles defeat. He served 17 aces and one double fault in two hours and 21 minutes against France’s No. 1, who had beaten him in their last meeting, in Shanghai last year. “Felix is a really great player,” Rinderknech said. “He proved today why he is so difficult to beat. I knew I was capable of beating him. I’ve done it before. It just didn’t go my way today.”

Canada had led 2-0 overnight and could have finished the tie in the doubles. Auger-Aliassime and Duncan Chan, making his Davis Cup debut, lost 7-6(4), 6-3 to Benjamin Bonzi and Pierre-Hugues Herbert, which kept France alive and put the Canadian No. 1 straight back on the court. On Friday Liam Draxl, ranked 205th, had beaten Rinderknech 6-2, 7-5, and Auger-Aliassime had beaten Quentin Halys 7-6(5), 4-6, 6-3, getting the only break of the third set when Halys double-faulted twice in a row from 15-30 at 1-2.

This was Auger-Aliassime’s first Davis Cup tie in two years and the first he had played in his home province. Canada had not staged a tie in Quebec City since 1974, and his father, Sam, runs a tennis academy nearby where he did much of his childhood training. “It carries a lot of significance for me,” he said. “Yes, we will probably remember our level or the ups and downs of the match, but I think we will remember more the emotions we lived through as a team.”

“I don’t really have words,” said the Canada captain, Frank Dancevic. “It’s incredible for the Davis Cup, for the country to have a player like that who can play at his level, playing singles and doubles and being in shape to play three matches over two days.”

The record According to The Canadian Press, 22,340 spectators attended over the two days, a Canadian Davis Cup record, passing the 21,842 who watched three days in Ottawa in 2017. The same report put Auger-Aliassime’s run of Davis Cup singles wins at ten, dating back to September 2022.

Bologna Canada reach the Final 8 for the sixth time and the first time since 2024; they won the title in 2022. They join South Korea, Austria and Czechia, who came from 2-1 down to beat the United States in Prague the same evening, and Italy, the hosts and three-time defending champions, in Bologna from 24 to 29 November.

France, ten-time champions, have now missed the last eight in six of the last seven years, according to The Canadian Press, and go into next February’s Qualifiers first round. Three places remain, with Germany and Croatia level in Halle and Great Britain and Spain each 2-0 up going into Sunday. The full field as it stands is in our Final 8 tracker, and the format is explained in how the Davis Cup works.

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