Madison Keys served for a place in the US Open fourth round twice on Saturday and lost both games. Then she served to stay in the match, and lost that one too. Zheng Qinwen won the last seven games from 0-5 down in the third set, saved a match point on the way through, and beat the No. 22 seed 1-6, 7-6(3), 7-5 on Grandstand in two hours and 28 minutes. She was flat on her back with both arms in the air when it was over.
The third set. Keys had taken the opening set for the loss of a single game and lost the second in a tiebreak, 7-3. At 5-0 in the decider the match was, for practical purposes, finished. What followed was not one collapse but three. Keys served at 5-1 holding a match point and was broken. She served at 5-3 and was broken to 15. She served at 5-5 and was broken again. Zheng held all four of her own service games in between, the last of them to serve out the match at the first opportunity.
Keys afterwards. The American did not reach for tactics in her press conference. She said she had built the lead and then become frightened of hitting through the ball, and that the problem was not confined to Saturday. “Tennis just feels really hard right now,” she said, fighting back tears. Two days earlier Keys had been 2-5 down in the third against Anna Bondar and saved five match points to win. She had saved another in the first round against Alina Korneeva. On Saturday she was the one holding the lead.
The qualifier. Zheng arrived in New York ranked 121 and started the fortnight in the qualifying draw, three matches before the main draw began. Right elbow surgery had cost her most of a year and dropped her as low as 160; before this tournament she had not won more than two matches in a row since returning. She has now won six in succession at Flushing Meadows. She is the first qualifier to reach the US Open women’s singles fourth round since Emma Raducanu in 2021, and Raducanu went on to win the title.
Next. Zheng plays Iga Swiatek, who came through Marie Bouzkova 7-6(3), 7-6(3) later on Saturday. Swiatek leads the head-to-head 7-1 and has never lost to Zheng on a hard court. The exception was the Paris semifinal at the 2024 Olympics — the fortnight that ended with Zheng taking gold.
Read more: Zheng Qinwen profile | Madison Keys profile | How Grand Slam qualifying works
