From Tennis Paradise to New York: US Open Storylines to Watch

Medvedev’s season highlights came early in the year in consecutive tournaments. He won the ATP 500 in Dubai and then – after taking a circuitous path to Indian Wells due to the breakout of the war in the Middle East – pushed Sinner to two tie-breaks in the championship match.

Medvedev has not reached a final since leaving the desert but he has a strong pedigree at the US Open, where he is a three-time finalist and where in 2021 he defeated Novak Djokovic in the championship match to deny the Serbian a calendar-year Grand Slam.

Seeded seventh in New York, Medvedev could set up a rematch with Alcaraz in the semi-finals, but he likely would need to get through fourth-seeded Djokovic in the quarter-finals.

Playing just his seventh tournament of the year, five-time BNP Paribas Open champion and 24-time Grand Slam champion Djokovic faces a tough second-round match against Italian Matteo Berrettini or wild card Stan Wawrinka, who beat the Serbian in the 2016 US Open final.

When the bright lights of New York come on, many of the storylines that took shape beneath the desert sun will return to center stage. Can Sabalenka and Rybakina navigate difficult draws to deliver another epic final? Can Alcaraz rediscover the form that carried him through Indian Wells before injury interrupted his season? And with Sinner absent and Djokovic, Zverev and Medvedev all sensing opportunity, will another chapter that began in Tennis Paradise find its ending at Flushing Meadows?