Aryna Sabalenka Complains About Smell During US Open Match
Aryna Sabalenka wrinkled her nose, took a step back from the baseline and looked up at the chair umpire. The world No. 1 wasn’t protesting a line call or a time violation. She was complaining about the smell.
“Someone is smoking weed,” she told Eva Asderaki-Moore during her second service game on Louis Armstrong Stadium. “Would you mind to… because it’s so strong.”
On a humid New York afternoon at the US Open, the tennis briefly stopped. The haze did not.
Sabalenka had raced to a 3-0 lead over Uzbekistan’s Kamilla Rakhimova in their third-round match when the pungent odour drifted across the court. She walked toward the chair, gestured, and Asderaki-Moore immediately radioed tournament officials, then mimed a smoking motion toward the stands to alert staff.
Members of the US Open team fanned out into the crowd, trying to pinpoint the source. The delay lasted only moments. The smell lingered longer than the interruption.
Once the brief fuss was over, Sabalenka did what she has done all fortnight: she locked back in. The defending champion tightened her focus, kept Rakhimova at arm’s length and closed out a controlled 6-3, 6-4 win to reach the fourth round without dropping a set.
A recurring cloud over Flushing Meadows
The incident was not an isolated quirk of New York life. It has become a running theme at this year’s tournament.
The USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center sits hard up against Flushing Meadows–Corona Park, where recreational cannabis is legal for adults 21 and over. That legality stops at the gates. Smoking of any kind is banned on US Open grounds, yet the breeze does not respect boundaries, carrying the scent from the park into the outer courts and, at times, the show courts.
Players have noticed.
British No. 1 Katie Boulter spoke earlier in the tournament about the same issue, particularly around Court 17 and the practice area.
“I have experienced it,” Boulter said. “You go down to the practice courts and down in the park courts, you do smell it a lot. I’m not a huge fan of it. I know a lot of players have complained on specific courts. I’ve played on (Court 17) before and I did smell it during my match. It’s something that I wouldn’t like to smell in the middle of my match.”
The complaints have forced the USTA to underline its stance. In a statement, it stressed that while it cannot control what happens in the surrounding park, it is “vigilant” in maintaining a smoke‑free environment inside the tennis center.
That is the tension of this US Open: a major global sporting event staged in the middle of a city that rarely softens its edges.
Champion’s composure
For Sabalenka, the smell was an irritation, not a turning point.
After the pause, she resumed her service game, kept her rhythm and never allowed Rakhimova a foothold. The Belarusian’s power game held up under the odd circumstances, her straight-sets victory another efficient step in a title defence that has so far been free of drama on the scoreboard, if not in the air around the court.
The world No. 1 walked off Louis Armstrong with the match secure, her campaign intact and one more story added to New York’s growing collection of offbeat US Open moments.
The question now is whether the only thing capable of disrupting her flow in New York will keep coming from the other side of the fence, rather than the other side of the net.
