Carlos Alcaraz dismissed concern after requesting a medical timeout during his third-round match at the US Open, saying the stop was purely preventive. The Spaniard defeated Lucas Darderi 6-2, 6-4, 6-0 to reach the last 32 at the New York event for the fourth time.

Mid-way through the second set Alcaraz appeared to feel his knee following what looked like an awkward service landing and signalled to his team. He asked the umpire for a medical timeout at the next changeover and received treatment from the physio before returning to the court.

Alcaraz closed the match strongly, breaking at 5-4 and winning the final seven games against Darderi.

“I’m feeling good,” Alcaraz clarified, during his post-match interview.

“It was just a precaution.

“I asked for the physio. I felt something that was not good in the knee, but after five or six points, it was gone.

“I just asked for the physio to take care of the knee because there was one serve left [in the second set] and I had to be ready, had to be good, had to feel good physically.

“It was a precaution. I will talk with my team but I’m not worried about it.”

The match was Alcaraz’s first day session at this year’s US Open, starting at 11:30AM. He arrived at the match in strong form, having won 33 of his last 34 matches and not dropping a set at the US Open so far.

“I tried to stay awake,” Alcaraz joked.

“That was important.

“We started at 11:30 so it’s good that I managed to play [my game]. My first goal was to start well, to start focused, with energy and a good rhythm, and I think I started pretty well. I pushed him to the limit.

“Tried to play long rallies and get a rhythm with the serve and return.

“And after that I just kept it going. Today I played such great tennis. It was such a great performance and I’m really proud about it.

“I’m not an early person so for me it’s difficult to wake up in the morning. That was one of the good things about today. I woke up early, did my warm up. Played good.”

Alcaraz will face Arthur Rinderknech in the fourth round. Rinderknech recently defeated world No 3 Alexander Zverev in the first round of Wimbledon and then endured a five-set battle with Alejandro Davidovich Fokina in his second round match in New York.

No. 6 seed Ben Shelton ended his US Open run in the third round after an acute shoulder injury forced him to retire. Shelton, who held a two-sets-to-one lead over Adrian Mannarino, alerted his father and coach Bryan during the match, saying, “I did something to my shoulder and I don’t know what it is,” and described feeling “in a lot of pain” before calling for a mid-game medical timeout.

Despite clearly compromised movement on several strokes, Shelton continued into the fourth set in the hope of closing the match. He was unable to sustain his level and made the emotional decision to stop competing when Mannarino returned from an off-court break and completed the set. The Frenchman won a tight sixth game in the fourth set that might have yielded a crucial break for Shelton, and he closed out that set on his sixth set point.

Shelton, 22, arrived at the tournament on the back of a breakthrough summer. He is a former US Open semifinalist and captured his first Masters 1000 title at the National Bank Open in Toronto earlier this season. He followed that victory with a quarterfinal showing at the Cincinnati Open and had dispatched Ignacio Buse and Pablo Carreño Busta in straight sets in the tournament’s opening rounds.

Mannarino, 37, a former world No. 17, was making his 15th main-draw appearance at the US Open and had never advanced beyond the third round until this match. The contest concluded with Shelton’s withdrawal, handing Mannarino the victory and ending what had been a promising evening for the young American.

Medical updates on Shelton’s shoulder were not provided here, and there was no further information released at the time of the retirement.

Apostolos Tsitsipas, coach and father of world No 28 Stefanos Tsitsipas, has pushed back against public criticism from Goran Ivanisevic while reaffirming his belief that his son can still reach the sport’s highest levels.

Following Stefanos Tsitsipas’s second-round defeat at the French Open to Matteo Gigante, Ivanisevic was hired to join the team for the grass-court season. That collaboration lasted just two tournaments and unraveled after a first-round Wimbledon retirement to Valentin Royer, attributed to an apparent back issue. Shortly after, Ivanisevic made sharp public comments:

“[Tsitsipas ] wasn’t mentally or physically prepared at Wimbledon. Back problems, a million problems. I am three times fitter.”

The split was soon followed by the return of Apostolos to the coaching team after a prolonged absence. On the eve of the US Open he addressed Ivanisevic’s approach to airing concerns publicly. “I didn’t like that he expressed his opinions publicly,” Tsitsipas’ father admitted, in a pre-US Open interview with Clay Tenis .

He expanded on how such matters should have been handled:

“Probably Goran saw something he didn’t like. He should have identified it at the beginning of their professional relationship with Stefanos and discussed it personally with Stefanos and his team and tell him what he wants from him.

“Goran is a professional, I’m sure he has his own ideas, how to make things working, but definitely he should have done it personally with Stefanos.

“It’s interesting for the public to know about all these things, but the most important [thing] for the people is to see Stefanos playing good tennis.

“And the responsible about that are the members of his team. We are teachers. Coaches must create the right environment for the player to develop.”

Results have been difficult since the reconciliation. Tsitsipas has lost seven of his last 10 matches, including a second-round US Open loss to Daniel Altmaier, 7-6(5), 1-6, 4-6, 6-3, 7-5, leaving him without a third-round appearance at any Grand Slam in 2025.

Still, Apostolos remained optimistic: “The sky is the limit,” he added. “Every player have to dream big and have high goals, but also be careful not to live too much in the future.

“They need to stay present, execute, and keep their goals in mind while being fully involved in daily work.

On his physicality, he said: It’s good. I’m sure It can always be better, but you can’t measure these things exactly.

“It’s good (physically). I’m sure It can always be better, but you can’t measure these things exactly. Players have peaks, then they go a bit down. It’s not always flat.

“Right now, he is at his peak I believe. He can compete here, he should be ready because it’s a Grand Slam. We did everything we could.

“Of course, you can always add things, but tennis is not only physical, it’s also mental.”