Alexander Zverev Advances to US Open Final with Authority
NEW YORK – Alexander Zverev is back on the biggest stage in New York, and this time he looks like a man who knows exactly how to handle it.
The French Open champion marched into the US Open final on Sept 11 with a 6-3, 7-6 (9-7), 7-6 (8-6) win over Karen Khachanov, a straight-sets scoreline that barely captures the tension of a night that kept threatening to crack open.
This is his third Grand Slam final in a row, his second at Flushing Meadows, and a return to the arena where he let a two-sets-to-love lead slip against Dominic Thiem in 2020. Four years on, the scars are still there, but so is something else: authority.
He showed it from the start. Zverev broke early, stamped his weight on the baseline exchanges and pocketed the opening set 6-3 with a minimum of fuss. The serve, that long-time barometer of his mood, held firm. Khachanov struggled to land enough first blows to push him back.
The pressure carried into the second set. Zverev grabbed an early break again and looked ready to run away with it. Then the match changed.
Khachanov, unseeded but never intimidated, finally found his range. He began to swing freely, thumping forehands, taking bigger cuts on the return. He broke back to snap Zverev’s streak of 37 consecutive service games at this US Open without being broken, a run that had underpinned the German’s surge through the draw after his early five-set marathons.
The Arthur Ashe crowd sensed a shift, and so did Zverev. The rallies lengthened, the margins shrank, and the second set bled into a gripping tie-break that stretched to 14 nervy minutes.
Khachanov twice looked ready to tilt the night his way, edging in front and forcing Zverev to come up with answers under real stress. The German did. He held his nerve, trusted his forehand, and watched as Khachanov blinked at the worst possible times, coughing up errors that turned a potential lifeline into a 7-6 (9-7) hole.
The pattern repeated in the third. Khachanov refused to go quietly, kept attacking, and again dragged the set into a breaker. Again he jumped ahead. Again Zverev reeled him in.
There was no panic in the German’s body language now, none of the old sagging shoulders. He tightened his game, leaned on the serve, and closed the door 8-6 in the tie-break to complete his seventh win in 10 meetings against the Russian.
It was his fourth straight match without losing a set after those early five-set tests, and it pushed his Grand Slam record this season to a remarkable 24-2. The numbers tell one story. The way he’s winning tells another: this is a player who has learned to live with the weight of expectation rather than run from it.
Zverev now walks back into a US Open final with a chance at a second major title and a shot at redemption in a stadium that once broke him. Waiting will be the winner of the all-American semi-final between Frances Tiafoe and Ben Shelton.
Different opponent. Different Zverev. Same stage.
