Carlos Alcaraz Begins US Open Title Defense Against Roman Safiullin
Carlos Alcaraz walks back into the US Open with a Grand Slam already in his pocket this season and four months of doubt in his right wrist.
The defending champion, out of action since April, opens his title defence on Monday against Russian shot-maker Roman Safiullin in a first-round match that feels far more dangerous than the rankings suggest. It is the kind of early test that can expose rust or confirm that a star is ready to rip straight through the draw.
Alcaraz has already wrapped up the career Grand Slam at record pace, his Australian Open triumph in January making him the youngest man to complete the set. Now he is trying to bookend the year with majors, from Melbourne to New York, with an injury layoff jammed in between.
He insists he is ready. The practice courts have been his proving ground, long, demanding sessions used to batter-test that right wrist until his confidence returned. His message is simple: he is prepared to “go 100 percent”.
Day 2 in New York is loaded. Alcaraz, Aryna Sabalenka, Iga Swiatek, Naomi Osaka, Wimbledon champion Linda Noskova – it reads like a second-week schedule, not a Monday.
Three Matches That Will Shape the Tournament’s Second Day
Roman Safiullin v Carlos Alcaraz (Head-to-head 1–1)
This is no gentle reintroduction.
Safiullin, 29, hits through the court and does not back off the baseline. He showed that at Wimbledon, where he knocked out Andrey Rublev and Joao Fonseca on his way to the fourth round before pushing Novak Djokovic to four sets. When he finds his range, rallies turn into target practice.
Alcaraz knows that first-hand. At the 2023 ATP Paris Masters, Safiullin stunned the then world number two, taking the ball early and denying the Spaniard time to create. Alcaraz took that loss personally enough to turn the tables at the Paris Olympics the following year, restoring order in their rivalry.
Now they meet on hard courts in New York, with the stakes higher and the questions louder. Has Alcaraz’s timing survived four months on the sidelines? Will the wrist hold up under the weight of Safiullin’s flat, heavy drives?
Safiullin has the tools to make this awkward. Alcaraz has the pedigree – and the memory of a shock defeat – to make sure it does not happen again.
Aryna Sabalenka v Camila Osorio (Sabalenka leads 2–0)
Sabalenka arrives as a two-time defending champion in New York and the current world number one, yet her season has started to tilt.
Back-to-back hard-court titles in Indian Wells and Miami in March looked like the launchpad for a dominant year. Instead, her form has slipped just enough to open the door in the rankings. Even if she joins Chris Evert and Serena Williams as the only women to win three straight US Open crowns, she could still lose top spot.
The results tell the story. A title in Brisbane and a run to the Australian Open final set a fierce early tempo. Then came a quarter-final exit at Roland Garros, a fourth-round departure at Wimbledon, and a mid-season lull that has invited questions about her momentum.
Sabalenka is not entertaining any crisis talk. Her response is defiance: “Throw tough challenges at me, I will come back stronger.”
Osorio, ranked 59, has felt Sabalenka’s weight of shot before. Their two meetings ended the same way: Sabalenka on top, once on the grass of Wimbledon in 2021, once on the clay of Madrid in 2023. Different surfaces, same outcome, the Belarusian overpowering the Colombian.
Osorio brings variety and grit, but she walks into a stadium where Sabalenka has built an aura. If the defending champion needs a reminder of who she is, Arthur Ashe Stadium tends to provide it.
Naomi Osaka v Anastasia Zakharova (First meeting)
Naomi Osaka knows exactly what this place can do for her.
The Japanese star owns two US Open titles, from 2018 and 2020, part of a four-major collection that once made her the standard-bearer on hard courts. The last of those Slam wins came in Australia five years ago, a lifetime in tennis terms.
Her journey since has been raw and public. Osaka has spoken openly about her mental health, stepped away from the sport to protect it, and then taken 15 months out to focus on motherhood before returning in 2023. The comeback has been steady rather than spectacular, but the signs are there.
This summer, the hard courts have started to feel like home again. She reached the semi-finals in Washington, then backed it up with a quarter-final run in Toronto. At Wimbledon, she produced her best-ever performance at the All England Club, reaching the quarter-finals and taking out Sabalenka along the way – a statement win on her least natural surface.
Now she comes back to Flushing Meadows, to a court where the memories are bright and the lines seem a little wider. “I think I've proven myself here, so I can kind of bank on that and use that to have confidence,” she said, leaning on history as fuel.
Across the net stands Anastasia Zakharova, ranked 101 and facing Osaka for the first time. On paper, this is the kind of match Osaka once devoured in an hour. Reality is different now: new priorities, a reshaped career, a field that has moved on.
What has not changed is the feeling when Osaka finds her range on a hard court. The ball explodes off the strings, the tempo rises, and opponents start to feel rushed.
On Day 2, Alcaraz tests his wrist, Sabalenka defends her throne, and Osaka tries to tap back into the version of herself that owned this city. The answers will not take long to arrive.
