Ben Shelton Advances to U.S. Open Second Round After Tough Start
NEW YORK – Under the lights of Arthur Ashe Stadium, Ben Shelton opened his U.S. Open campaign looking nothing like a man tipped to end a two-decade American drought. For half an hour, he was barely in the match.
By the end, he was striding off with a 1-6 6-1 7-6(3) 6-2 win over Tallon Griekspoor and a reminder of why he carries so much of the home nation’s hope.
A nightmare start
Shelton’s first set was a mess. The eighth seed sprayed 14 unforced errors, tossed in two double faults and managed to hold serve just once. Griekspoor, fresh off that eye-catching upset of top seed Alexander Zverev in Montreal, needed no second invitation. He rushed through the opener in less than 30 minutes, dictating with his aggressive patterns and denying Shelton any sort of rhythm.
Shelton admitted as much.
“I started off a little bit nervous tonight, but I found my rhythm at some point through the second set,” he said. “Obviously, a lot of credit to Tallon, he’s a good player to play, he doesn’t give you a lot of rhythm. He has an attacking game style and I found things really difficult for the first set tonight.”
At that stage, the top American in the men’s draw looked tight, rushed, and oddly flat for a player who arrived in New York riding high after defending his Canadian Open title.
The switch flips
Then the match turned. Sharply.
Shelton began to land his first serve with purpose, stepping into returns instead of blocking them back. The forehand that had flown long and wide in the opening set suddenly started ripping through the court. Griekspoor, who had been in complete control, found himself pushed back and hurried.
The second set became a role reversal. Shelton broke three times, dominating the baseline exchanges and feeding off the crowd as the noise inside Ashe rose with every thunderous serve and fist pump. The 6-1 scoreline mirrored the opener, but this time in American colours.
What had looked like a dangerous first-round trap now felt like a test of composure he was starting to pass.
Edge in the breaker
The third set settled into a proper contest. Griekspoor steadied, held serve, and again tried to take time away from Shelton with early strikes and bold court positioning. The Dutchman’s game, though, carries risk, and as the tension crept in, so did the errors.
Neither man blinked on serve, and they played their way into a tiebreak that felt pivotal. Shelton tightened up his patterns, trusted his serve, and waited. Griekspoor cracked first.
Loose points at key moments, a forehand here, a backhand there, and then the killer: his sixth double fault of the match, gifting Shelton the breaker 7-3 and with it a two-sets-to-one lead.
The pressure had flipped sides. Shelton, still chasing his first Grand Slam title, suddenly looked every bit the favourite his seeding suggests.
Full control to the finish
Once in front, Shelton didn’t let him back in.
He tore into the fourth set, breaking twice to surge 4-0 ahead and silencing any notion of a five-set scrap. The serve that had betrayed him early now pinned Griekspoor behind the baseline; the American’s movement and shot selection grew sharper as the Dutchman’s resistance faded.
Shelton closed it out 6-2, wrapping up a performance that veered from ragged to ruthless but ultimately underlined his threat in New York.
He moves on to a second-round meeting with Hubert Hurkacz, a step up in both ranking and reputation. The task only gets tougher. But if Shelton can bottle what came after that brutal first set, the chase to become the first American man since 2003 to lift this trophy stays very much alive.
