US Open
Jannik Sinner has withdrawn from the US Open with a right knee injury, the first Grand Slam the world No. 1 has missed since 2019. Carlos Alcaraz, absent for four months with a wrist problem, has confirmed he will play and defend his title. Between them the two announcements have rewritten the last major of the year: Alexander Zverev becomes top seed, and the Alcaraz–Sinner final that the sport has been building towards all summer is off before the draw is even made.
Sinner: “We have had to make the difficult decision”
The knee has been a problem since early August. Sinner pulled out of the Cincinnati Open on 9 August with a right knee issue and has not played a competitive match since winning Wimbledon in July. He returned to court in Monte Carlo in the days before the announcement, and it was that work which settled the question the wrong way.
“Even though I have been working hard with my team and my medical staff, we have now had to make the difficult decision that I will not be able to compete at the US Open this year,” he said in a statement on 21 August.
The scale of it is easy to understate. Sinner won this title in 2024 and lost last year’s final to Carlos Alcaraz, so he defends a very large block of ranking points by not defending them at all. He has not missed a Grand Slam since 2019.
Alcaraz Is Back
The other announcement points the other way. Carlos Alcaraz has confirmed he will play, ending an absence that began when he retired hurt at the Barcelona Open in April. The right wrist injury cost him Roland-Garros, Wimbledon, the National Bank Open and the Cincinnati Open — four months and two majors.
He returns as defending champion and, with Sinner gone, as the biggest name in the draw. He also returns without a single hard-court match. No player has successfully defended the US Open men’s title since Roger Federer in 2008, and nobody has tried it cold from four months out.
What It Does to the Draw
Alexander Zverev becomes the top seed in New York, moving up in the rankings in Sinner’s absence. It is a meaningful promotion for a player who won his maiden Grand Slam at Roland-Garros this year and reached the Wimbledon final, and who has already been a US Open finalist in 2020, when he came within two points of the title.
Below him the picture is unusually open. Novak Djokovic, a four-time champion here, arrives off a first-round Cincinnati defeat to Thiago Tirante. Taylor Fritz reached the 2024 final and went out in the Cincinnati quarter-finals. Ben Shelton won the National Bank Open and then lost his opening match in Cincinnati to a qualifier. Not one of them arrives with a settled form line.
The Second Withdrawal Story of the Fortnight
Sinner is not the only significant absentee. In the women’s draw Elina Svitolina withdrew from Cincinnati with an ankle injury, and Elena Rybakina retired from her Cincinnati quarter-final with a left heel problem while two wins from the world No. 1 ranking. Both go to New York with fitness questions attached.
The hard-court swing has been unusually punishing, and the US Open begins on 30 August with more of its marquee names carrying doubts than at any major this year.
How This Changes the Betting
Every ante-post price on Sinner is void. He had been expected to head the men’s market as world No. 1 and 2024 champion, and our own US Open predictions had him as the pick — a call we made with the fitness caveat stated, and the caveat has won.
What replaces him is a genuinely open market. Alcaraz will shorten on reputation, which is exactly the situation where a defending champion gets over-backed relative to the evidence: four months out, no tune-up, and a title to defend. Zverev is top seed with a major already won this season. The value, as ever in a draw missing its anchor, is more likely to sit with a seed who inherits an easier section than at the top of the book. Our updated angles are on the US Open betting tips page, which we will rebuild once the draw is made on 27 August.
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