Some days, opportunity knocks. Other times, it kicks the door down. And at this year’s US Open, the shock exit of tournament favourite Carlos Alcaraz has opened a pathway for two very different British players.
The man most directly affected is Jack Draper, 22, who had been expecting to play Alcaraz on Saturday, but will now face Alcaraz’s unpronounceable Dutch conqueror: Botic van der Zandschulp.
This is potentially wonderful timing for Draper, coming as it does in the first major since Andy Murray’s retirement. On the eve of this US Open, Draper had told reporters that he felt “a responsibility to really play good tennis and be the British No1”.
Yet Draper is not the only Briton who could benefit. Thirty-four-year-old veteran Dan Evans might be a little further away in the draw, needing to win two more rounds before he would encounter the Alcaraz vacuum.
But after Evans’s efforts this week – which have already seen him eliminate 23rd seed Karen Khachanov in the longest US Open match in history – no one should be writing him off.
Thursday’s matches not only delivered defeat for Alcaraz, but also for Hubert Hurkacz, the seventh seed who was the other major roadblock in this second quarter of the draw.
The upshot is that we are now guaranteed a first-time grand-slam semi-finalist. Eight hopefuls are effectively contesting a mini-tournament in the space left by Alcaraz’s defeat. As long as other results follow the formbook, the prize on offer will be a semi-final meeting with world No1 Jannik Sinner next Friday.
At this stage, the bookmakers are quoting Draper – who has eased through his first two rounds without dropping a set – as the two-to-one favourite to emerge from the pack and reach the last four.
Should he do so, Draper will join an elite group of only six British men over the last half-century who have contested a grand-slam semi-final: John Lloyd, Tim Henman, Greg Rusedski, Andy Murray, Kyle Edmund and Cameron Norrie.
Yet there is something ridiculous about making such predictions before we have even reached the first weekend. Especially as an open draw is not always a blessing. The pressure of expectation can make your racket feel like a dumb-bell in your hand.
On the other hand, Van der Zandschulp is a very different calibre of player to Alcaraz, whose four major titles by the age of 21 put him far ahead of either Roger Federer or Novak Djokovic at the same stage of their careers.
The contrast was particularly piquant at May’s French Open. While Alcaraz came away celebrating his maiden Roland Garros title, Van der Zandschulp found himself considering retirement at the untimely age of 28, after a first-round defeat by Fabio Fognini had extended a 12-month slump.
Rather than wallowing in despair, however, he responded by dropping down to second-tier Challenger events, where he reached successive finals in a pair of obscure German cities: Braunschweig and Lüdenscheid.
A few wins can work wonders for a player’s confidence, and by the time Van der Zandschulp walked out to face Alcaraz on Thursday night, he was cleaning the lines with nerveless, tension-free tennis. Should he rekindle the magical touch he displayed on Arthur Ashe Arena, it won’t be easy for Draper – whose own key shot is a viciously swinging lefty serve – to shoot down the flying Dutchman.
Both men arrive at this stage of the tournament without having dropped a set, although Van der Zandschulp – who took out the former Wimbledon semi-finalist Denis Shapovalov in his opening match – has clearly faced the higher standard of opponent.
Draper: Criticism has been good for me
In Draper’s case, Zhang Zhizhen didn’t even complete their first-round meeting because of injury, while Argentine dirtballer Facundo Díaz Acosta looked eager to return to the clay courts when he succumbed limply on Thursday afternoon.
Yet Draper still deserves credit for two professional showings after a disrupted build-up. In the week before the US Open, he had not only parted company with so-called “supercoach” Wayne Ferreira but also come under fire for his reaction to a bump-ball controversy at the Cincinnati Open.
“It was my first experience of having negativity and having criticism,” said Draper, who was bombarded by social-media trolls claiming that he had deliberately cheated. “It’s good for me to go through this, and understand that people are going to be quick to jump on your back.”
Returning to the draw, there is still one high-ranking seed in Alcaraz’s vacated section. Evans’s opponent on Saturday is world No10 Alex de Minaur, who would normally be considered the favourite to take advantage of the chaos. As things stand, though, de Minaur is not operating at full fitness, because of the lingering after-effects of a hip injury he picked up at Wimbledon.
“If I had to say, I’m 80 to 85 per cent, hopefully trending upwards,” said de Minaur on Thursday after a straight-sets win over Finland’s Otto Virtanen. “Expectations were very low going in. I wasn’t really sure if I was going to be able to be here and compete. So I’m taking every day as a bonus.”
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