Andy Murray slams ‘amateurish’ US Open scheduling after 2am finish
Andy Murray has criticised scheduling at the US Open this year after the latest women’s finish in history at the tournament.
This is the first Grand Slam tournament since Murray has been retired, but he still appears to be watching tennis at the tournament that he won back in 2012.
In this case it appeared to be related to the Olympic final rematch between Qinwen Zheng and Donna Vekic, with the former getting the victory once again after a near three hour battle on Arthur Ashe Stadium that finished at 2:14am.
This match did not even get underway until 11:25pm in New York, as it followed the match between Frances Tiafoe and Alexei Popyrin.
And Murray dd not appear impressed by this, after writing a post on X (formerly known as Twitter) calling out tennis bodies, “The tennis scheduling situation is a total mess. It looks so amateurish having matches going on at 2,3 4am. Sort it out @usopen @AustralianOpen @Wimbledon @rolandgarros @atptour @WTA @ITFTennis.”
The tennis scheduling situation is a total mess. It looks so amateurish having matches going on at 2,3 4am👎 Sort it out @usopen @AustralianOpen @Wimbledon @rolandgarros @atptour @WTA @ITFTennis
— Andy Murray (@andy_murray) September 2, 2024
Murray is no stranger to late finishes himself, having played until after 4am at the Australian Open last year.
This is not the first late start time to a match at the US Open this year, with Aryna Sabalenka beginning her third round match against Ekaterina Alexandrova after midnight a few days ago.
Despite all of the controversy surrounding the scheduling, Olympic champion Zheng appears to be embracing it all, “It’s always nice for me to play at the night session. I’m used to it.
“When I played in Palermo all the time I played really late. It’s my first time playing here in New York till two in the morning. That’s unbelievable. Thanks to the fans who are not sleeping tonight and supported me here.”
Zheng will now move onto the US Open quarter-finals for a second consecutive year, where she will take on the aforementioned second seed Sabalenka.
Inside the baseline…
Andy Murray is spot on here, you cannot be starting tennis matches this late and especially when you risk the chance of a three hour match. This can have a detrimental impact on the remainder of the tournament, with players involved in late finishes sometimes unable to recover. On another point it also does seem wrong for a best-of-three women’s night session match to follow a best-of-five men’s match, so that is also something that should be looked at.
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