Stefanos Tsitsipas bowed out of the 2025 US Open in a dramatic second-round match, losing 6-7(5), 6-1, 6-4, 3-6, 5-7 to world No 56 Daniel Altmaier in a contest that lasted four hours and 26 minutes on Thursday. The defeat ended Tsitsipas’ run at Flushing Meadows and followed a heated exchange at the net.

After Altmaier saved a match point in the fifth set and completed his comeback, Tsitsipas confronted his opponent at the handshake over an underarm serve, telling Altmaier: “Next time, don’t wonder why I hit you, ok? No, I’m just saying, if you serve underarm… if you serve underarm,” Altmaier appeared surprised and walked away while Tsitsipas remained visibly frustrated.

Former world No 1 Justine Henin criticised Tsitsipas’ conduct and suggested it reflected a deeper problem. “Altmaier has every right to serve under the arm. I don’t think he would have reacted like that a year or two ago,” she said. “There’s a bit of an ego issue: ‘I don’t get served under the arm.’ That says a lot about everything he’s been going through for a while. It feels a bit like being in kindergarten, almost.”

Altmaier addressed the incident in his press conference and acknowledged the emotions that can follow a long match. “I know that sometimes in the heat of the moment, you can say stuff you don’t normally would like to say.

“You regret afterwards. So I think we all know about these discussions at the net; I’m not a fan of it.

“Even if I would have lost, I would not enter discussions because it’s just, like, the heat of the moment.

“You need to cool down; let’s see if he reacts to it or sticks to his opinion. Which is fine for me. I know what I did and that’s it. It’s part of the game.”

Tsitsipas, a former world No 3 now ranked 28th, holds a 20-17 (54%) record in 2025. The 27-year-old has struggled for consistency and has not won consecutive matches since the Barcelona Open in April. The best result of his season was claiming the Dubai Championships in February/March.

Coco Gauff and Naomi Osaka meet on Monday in a highly anticipated US Open fourth-round match, their sixth career meeting and first since Osaka retired injured in their 2024 China Open encounter. The 23rd seed Osaka faces third seed Gauff in a Labor Day prime time slot, selected as the second day session match inside Arthur Ashe Stadium.

Both players already collected the baseline points awarded for main-draw entry, with 10 WTA Ranking points given to everyone in round one. By advancing to the fourth round this year, Gauff and Osaka each hold 240 WTA Ranking points from the US Open.

For Gauff, that equals her 2024 result, when she reached the fourth round before a three-set loss to Emma Navarro. The American sits on 7,874 points in the WTA Live Rankings and is positioned at world No 2 in the live rankings, ahead of Iga Swiatek.

Osaka returned to the top 30 following a Canadian Open run earlier this month and began the tournament ranked world No 24. She has exceeded the 70 points she earned for reaching the second round in 2024 and now moves to 1,949 points in the WTA Live Rankings, provisionally up two places to world No 22.

A win in New York awards 430 ranking points for a quarter-final place. That result would move Osaka to 2,139 points and provisionally into the top 20 at world No 19. Victory for Gauff would raise her to 8,064 points and preserve her live ranking of No 2.

Prize money at the US Open has reached new records, with the singles champions set to collect $5,000,000. The two players have already earned significant sums by reaching the second week: $110,000 for round one, $154,000 for round two, $237,000 for round three and $400,000 for reaching the fourth round. A quarter-final appearance carries $660,000.

Heading into the tournament, Osaka had earned $1,180,367 for 2025, while Gauff had amassed $5,946,685 in season earnings to date.

Taylor Fritz acknowledged the scale of the task ahead as he prepares to face Novak Djokovic in the quarter-finals of the 2025 US Open. Fritz enters the match having lost all 10 previous meetings with Djokovic, results that came between 2019 and 2024. This will be their fourth encounter at a Grand Slam; Djokovic beat Fritz at the Australian Open in 2024 and 2021 and at the US Open in 2023.

Their most recent meeting came at the Shanghai Masters in October last year, where Djokovic prevailed 6-4, 7-6(6) after saving a set point in a decisive second set.

Fritz reached the Flushing Meadows quarter-finals by defeating Emilio Nava, Lloyd Harris, Jerome Kym and Tomas Machac. Djokovic advanced by beating Learner Tien, Zachary Svajda, Cameron Norrie and Jan-Lennard Struff.

After his 6-4, 6-3, 6-3 fourth-round victory over Machac, Fritz put the head-to-head record into context. “I think the thing is, it’s spanned over so many years,” the world No 4 said.

“I think the first, probably like seven or eight times I played him, I wasn’t just a good enough player to have that much of a chance, unless I have like the best day ever and he has a bad day.

“Only the last couple times we’ve played I think I’ve been this, just better player that can, I’d say compete and have chances and last time we played, Shanghai, I had looks, I had set points in the second set, I really probably should have won the second, taken it to a third set.

“But yeah, think what makes it tough is he serves well, he serves aggressive on second serves. It’s tough to take advantage of his serve for how well he also returns and just is from the baseline, he backs it up incredibly well with the serve, so it’s tough to sometimes get on him the way that he’s I guess getting on you with the return.”

The 27-year-old also reflected on how to overturn a one-sided head-to-head. “I think the way to turn around is just to become a better player,” Fritz assessed.

“I think that Coco would probably say the same thing. I think she would probably tell me that she was just better at tennis when she started reversing the head-to-head.

“And for me, in my head I’m not thinking about all the losses I had to Novak when I was like… five years ago. I was nowhere near the level of player that I am now.

“What I’m thinking about, fresh in my mind is when we played at World Tour Finals (2022), that one, and the one in Shanghai last year. In those ones, I served for the set in the World Tour Finals, I had set point serving in Shanghai.

“I know that in the most recent matches we’ve had, there’s been looks and I just haven’t been able to make it happen in the important moments of those matches.

“And that’s what makes the best guys the best guys, is they’re not going to give it to you in those moments. You have to go and take it.”