Carlos Alcaraz seemed to have a point to make regarding the U.S. Open during his press conference in London on Thursday. He described his recent early-morning quarterfinal match against Ben Shelton as “too much.”
In recent years, late finishes at Grand Slam tournaments have become fairly typical, but Alcaraz’s match with Shelton extended until 3:33 a.m., setting a new record for the latest finish in U.S. Open history. This surpassed the previous record of 2:50 a.m., which he had set with Jannik Sinner in 2022.
“For an athlete to be finishing at 3:30 in the morning, it means we had to leave the courts at 4:30, then back to the hotel,” Alcaraz said. “You don’t get to sleep until 6:30 or 7 in the morning. So, when you have to recover for the next match, your opponent has the edge.”
The quarterfinal match was quite a spectacle, going the full five sets and resulting in Shelton’s upset victory over the former World No. 1.
A scheduling domino effect that day pushed back the match start times, with the first night match beginning at around 8:20 p.m., which was over an hour late from what was planned.
“It’s unfortunate that a match like this didn’t reach as many fans as it could have because they have to go to bed and work in the morning,” he noted. “If it had started at 7 or 8 p.m. and finished by 11, the stadium would’ve been full. A lot of people had to miss out because of the timing.”
Even though the quarterfinal match started late, ESPN still managed to attract an average of 1.3 million viewers.
USTA director Craig Tiley responded to the critiques about scheduling in an interview with Sky Sports earlier this month. He mentioned, “I hear from a lot of people that it finishes too late, and I say, OK, what’s your suggestion? I don’t get anything. You can’t control the length of the match.”
