It was a punishing Friday afternoon for American men’s tennis as Ben Shelton and Frances Tiafoe were bundled out of the US Open less than an hour apart, leaving only Taylor Fritz and Tommy Paul still standing in the singles draw.
Shelton, the No 6 seed and one of the leading contenders to end the United States’ 22-year wait for a men’s grand slam champion, was forced to retire from his third-round match against France’s Adrian Mannarino with a shoulder injury. It was the 22-year-old’s first career retirement, coming as he led by two sets to one before disaster struck late in the third.
After landing heavily on his left arm while stretching for a ball, Shelton grimaced and told his father and coach, Bryan: “I did something to my shoulder. I don’t know what it is.” He later admitted the pain was “really high” and said: “I’ve never retired before. I’m not a guy who would retire if I could continue.” Despite a mid-set visit from the physio and a tactical switch that saw him attempt 13 serve-and-volley plays in the fourth set alone, he could not protect his advantage. Mannarino leveled the contest and, as the crowd braced for a decider, Shelton bowed his head on the changeover and called it off. The Frenchman advanced 3-6, 6-3, 4-6, 6-4, ret.
Shelton left Louis Armstrong Stadium with his shoulder wrapped in ice, a towel over his head and fighting back tears. Still, he struck a philosophical tone: “I was playing really well, I was in form, a lot of confidence … but I’ve got a lot to be grateful for. You won’t hear me pouting about how bad things are with the summer that I’ve had.”
For the 37-year-old Mannarino, ranked 77th in the world, it was a bittersweet breakthrough: his first win over a top-10 opponent at a major in 23 attempts and his first appearance in the second week of the US Open. He will face the Czech No 20 seed, Jiri Lehecka, for a place in the quarter-finals.
If that setback was not dispiriting enough for the home crowd, Tiafoe soon followed. The 17th seed, a semi-finalist in New York in two of the past three years, fell flat against German qualifier Jan-Lennard Struff before an overflow crowd on the Grandstand court. The 35-year-old struck 14 aces and never allowed Tiafoe to find rhythm, closing out a 6-4, 6-3, 7-6 (9) upset to reach the last 16 here for the first time.
“I played extremely passive today. I didn’t put any pressure on him at all,” Tiafoe said. “It’s going to be hard to swallow how I played today and being out of the US Open this early. I haven’t been this down in a very, very long time.” He also bemoaned the quick conditions on Grandstand, saying he was “late on everything” and never found his timing.
Struff, who had already toppled the No 11 seed Holger Rune, extended an unlikely run after failing to win a match at Flushing Meadows since 2020. His reward could be a fourth-round meeting with Novak Djokovic, who was due to face Cameron Norrie in Friday’s night session. For Tiafoe, it marked his earliest exit in New York since 2019.
The American had not even realized Shelton had retired until told in his press conference. “That always sucks to go out like that,” he said. “Especially in a grand slam [in a match] where he was probably going to win.”
The twin blows leave just two American men standing. Fritz, last year’s runner-up in Queens and a Wimbledon semi-finalist in July, was scheduled to play Swiss qualifier Jérôme Kym on Friday night. Paul, a 2023 Australian Open semi-finalist, had survived a five-set epic against Nuno Borges that ended in the early hours of the morning.
Andy Roddick’s 2003 triumph remains the most recent men’s major title for an American. On a bruising afternoon in Queens, the odds of that drought coming to an end next week narrowed considerably.
