u.s. open

U.S. tennis star Taylor Townsend wasn’t prepared for some of the food she would be offered while taking part in the Billie Jean King Cup Finals tournament in Shenzen, China.

She apparently was also not expecting the backlash she faced after she posted her criticism of some of the local dishes — which included bullfrogs, turtles, sea cucumbers and, in her words, “an animal lung” that was “sliced up” and on a skewer — on Instagram.

Those posts have since been removed, and Townsend has posted a video on her Instagram Story in which the world’s top-ranked doubles player apologizes “sincerely from the bottom of my heart.”

“I understand that I am so privileged as a professional athlete to be able to travel all around the world and experience cultural differences, which is one of the things that I love so much about what I do,” Townsend said.

“I have had nothing but the most amazing experience and time here … and everyone has been so kind and so gracious. And the things that I said were not representative of that at all.”

The 29-year-old Townsend’s name was in the headlines during last month’s U.S. Open. After Taylor defeated Latvia’s Jelena Ostapenko in the second round of the singles competition, the players appeared to have a heated discussion.

Afterward, Townsend told reporters that Ostapenko “told me I have no education, no class.”

Ostapenko later apologized on her Instagram Story and explained that English isn’t her native language. “So when I said education,” Ostapenko wrote, “I was speaking only about what I believe [is] tennis etiquette, but I understand how the words I used could have offended many people beyond the tennis court.”

Townsend is one of six players representing the U.S. in the international team tournament in Shenzen. Earlier this week, she posted video of some of the food she and her teammates had been offered, apparently as part of a buffet. She also added a video of herself from later in the evening in which she criticized some of the offerings.

“I’m honestly just so shocked I like what I saw in the dinner buffet … These people are literally killing frogs. Bull frogs. Aren’t those poisonous? Like, aren’t those the ones that be giving you warts and boils and stuff?” Townsend said. “And turtles? And the fact that, like, it’s all stewed up with, like, chilies and peppers and onions and like, ‘Oh, you really made this a dish?’

“And then you got the sea cucumbers just staring there, like with the noodles, the only thing that we eat. So all in all, gotta give this like a solid 2 out of 10 so far, because this is crazy.”

One portion of the video, which showed portions of the buffet spread, featured the caption, “This is the craziest thing I’ve ever seen … and people are eating this,” followed by emojis of a melting face and a face screaming in fear.

The comments went viral on Chinese social media, with many commenters slamming Townsend as culturally insensitive.

Townsend’s apology comes as the U.S. prepares to face Kazakhstan on Thursday in the quarterfinals.

“I just truly wanted to apologize,” Townsend said in the new video. “There’s no excuse, there’s no words, and for me, I just — I will be better.”

Venus Williams had made it to the quarterfinal round of the U.S. Open women’s doubles competition five times. Each time, she was partnered with younger sister Serena Williams.

Venus Williams is back in the U.S. Open quarterfinals this year, for the first time since 2014, with new doubles partner Leylah Fernandez.

Williams’ retired sibling hasn’t made it to Flushing Meadows for any of this year’s action so far, but the seven-time Grand Slam singles champion made a plea for that to change following her and Fernandez’s 6-3, 6-4 victory over Zhang Shuai and Ekaterina Alexandrova on Monday.

“She’s so happy for Leylah and I, and she’s given us advice,” Williams said of her sister during an on-court interview. “We just need her in the box. So, my message is: Serena, you need to show up.”

Williams was responding to a question about a recent TikTok post by Serena in which the 23-time Grand Slam singles champion is watching Williams and Fernandez on TV and rolling her eyes. Once she notices she is being filmed, however, Serena forces some humorously fake-looking smiles.

“When you see your sister @Venus Williams has a new doubles partner @leylahanniefernandez and you are really happy she’s winning with someone else…” the caption reads.

Venus Williams called the post “very funny.”

The Williams sisters have won 14 Grand Slam titles (including the U.S. Open in 1999 and 2009) and three Olympic gold medals as doubles partners. While Serena hasn’t played since the 2022 U.S. Open, Venus returned to the court after a lengthy hiatus for July’s D.C. Open.

At that tournament, the 45-year-old Williams became the second-oldest woman to win a tour-level singles match with a first-round victory over 23-year-old Peyton Stearns. Williams also won a first-round doubles match with 23-year-old partner Hailey Baptiste.

At the U.S. Open, Williams lost her first-round singles match to 29-year-old Karolina Muchova in three sets. But she and Fernandez, a 22-year-old Canadian who played in the 2021 U.S. Open singles final, have been on a roll. They have yet to drop a set in three rounds of play.

Williams told reporters that Serena has actually been very supportive.

“She’s definitely coaching from afar, and she’s so excited,” Williams said. “She gets so nervous watching, and she’s got the kids watching. They’re all at home, just really on our side.”

Williams also addressed her earlier request for her sister to “show up” for Tuesday’s quarterfinal match against the top-seeded duo of Taylor Townsend and Katerina Siniakova.

“If she came, it would be a dream for both of us,” Williams said. “We’d have her on the court coaching. And we’d force her to hit, even though she doesn’t hit often.”

She added with a laugh,”So it’s probably best she doesn’t come because we’d just like, probably bully her.”

Coco Gauff was struggling for the second time in as many matches this week at the U.S. Open.

At one point during her second-round match against Donna Vekic on Thursday in Arthur Ashe Stadium, the world’s No. 3-ranked player became overwhelmed and couldn’t stop the tears from flowing.

Gauff played through it all, however, and advanced with a 7-6 (5), 6-2 victory. She became emotional again afterward as she thanked the crowd for its support.

“You really helped me a lot,” the two-time major championship winner said during her post-match interview.

Gauff indicated that one member of the crowd in particular provided extra inspiration during the match — U.S. gymnastics legend Simone Biles. The seven-time Olympic gold medalist has been open about her mental health struggles during a career in which she has also won 23 world titles.

“Honestly, I saw her and … she helped me pull it out,” said Gauff, who later told reporters that her “Mount Rushmore of athletes” consisted of Biles and tennis legend Serena Williams. “I was just thinking if she could go on a six-inch beam and do that, with all the pressures of the world, then I can hit the ball in this 75 — I don’t know how big this court is.

Coco Gauff reacts after defeating Donna Vekic during the second round of the U.S. Open on Thursday in New York.

(Frank Franklin II / Associated Press)

“So, yeah, I saw her late in the second getting interviewed by ESPN and, yeah, it brought me a little bit of calm, just knowing her story, with all the things she went through mentally. So, she’s an inspiration, surely, and her presence definitely did help me today.”

During her in-match interview with ESPN’s Katie George, Biles said she came to the U.S. Open specifically to watch Gauff.

“She’s incredible, amazing, and it’s like, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” Biles said. “It’s just such a privilege to watch her on home soil and watch Black Girl Magic.”

Soon after the match, the two athletes had the opportunity to meet.

“Gymnastics is so different, so I just wanted to scream, ‘Go, Coco!’” Biles told Gauff. “But then they were like, ‘Maybe not right now.’ And I was like, ‘Got it.’ But congrats. I love watching you, everything you do.”

The winner of the 2023 U.S. Open and 2025 French Open told her idol: “You’re such an inspiration. Like, seriously. What I said in the [on-court] interview, I was thinking about that literally.

“My mom did gymnastics on a way lower level than you. And so, she was like, ‘If I can focus on that, then you can do that.’ So, I was like, ‘OK, I guess you’re right.’ … You’re an inspiration, seriously.”

Russian tennis star Daniil Medvedev has been fined $42,500 by the U.S. Open for his actions during and immediately after his first-round loss to France’s Benjamin Bonzi on Sunday night in New York.

The total fines, issued by tournament referee Jake Garner, included $30,000 for unsportsmanlike conduct and another $12,500 for racket abuse.

With Medvedev facing match point in the third set, Bonzi missed on his first serve and was preparing for the second when a photographer appeared to mistakenly step onto the court.

Chair umpire Greg Allensworth announced that Bonzi would be given another chance at his first serve “because of the delay caused by an outside interference.”

Medvedev was not happy. The 2021 U.S. Open champion berated Allensworth at the chair and insulted him while leaning into a microphone to address the crowd. Even as he was walking back onto the court, Medvedev used arm gestures to encourage the crowd to continue expressing its displeasure with the decision, although he eventually motioned for the fans to calm down.

“I just expressed my emotions, my unhappiness with the decision,” Medvedev said later. “And then the crowd did what they did without me, without me asking them too much. And it was fun to witness.”

The disruption lasted for roughly six minutes. Medvedev ended up winning that point and set, then won the next set as well. Bonzi recovered in the fifth set for a 6-3, 7-5, 6-7 (5), 0-6, 6-4 win, after which Medvedev was seen repeated destroying a racket by smashing it on the court and against a sideline chair.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Carlos Alcaraz arrived at the U.S. Open on Monday with a new hairdo.

Actually, he arrived at Flushing Meadows with no hairdo — as in no hair at all, aside from some teeny, tiny specks on his head that come to a widow’s peak.

The world’s No. 2-ranked player was asked about his shocking new look following his 6-4, 7-5, 6-4 victory over Opelka. Alcaraz told reporters that he had simply wanted a haircut before the tournament, but one of his brothers “misunderstood” how to use the clippers.

The resulting mess, he said, left him with no choice but to start over with a clean pate.

“The only way to fix it is just shave it off,” a casual Alcaraz said.

Alcaraz isn’t bothered by the situation. As he reminded the reporters, hair grows back.

“I’m not really into, you know, the hair at all,” Alcaraz said. “So I’m the guy who thinks like, OK, the hair grows, you know? And then [in] a few days it’s gonna be already OK, I guess.”

Alcaraz apparently is not kidding about the speed at which his hair grows. He mentioned it to reporters during the Australian Open, after arriving in toasty Melbourne with shorter locks than usual.

Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz serves during a practice session ahead of the Australian Open on Jan. 9 in Melbourne.

(Mark Baker / Associated Press)

“I discussed with my barber that when I get a haircut… three days later it’s grown out,” Alcaraz said in Melbourne. “So I have to go more often.”

Alcaraz unintentionally provided a demonstration during the French Open, where he first sported a rather bushy look during his first-round win over Giulio Zeppieri on May 26.

Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz celebrates after winning a point during his first-round French Open match against Italy’s Giulio Zeppieri on May 26 in Paris.

(Thibault Camus / Associated Press)

Two days later, however, Alcaraz returned to the court for his second-round match against Nuno Borges with a ‘do possibly (but probably not) inspired by Moe Howard from the “Three Stooges.” Alcaraz told befuddled reporters after the match that he “had to do something” about his hair and beard, so he flew in his personal barber.

Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz returns the ball to Portugal’s Nuno Borges during their second-round match of the French Open on May 28 in Paris.

(Christophe Ena / Associated Press)

A mere 11 days later, when Alcaraz defeated Jannik Sinner in the final match for his fifth major championship, he was back to looking like this:

Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz celebrates after defeating Italy’s Jannik Sinner in the French Open final June 8 in Paris.

(Lindsey Wasson / Associated Press)

So if Alcaraz happens to win the U.S. Open championship, like he did in 2022, he might have a lengthy mane while hoisting the trophy at Arthur Ashe Stadium at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center.

In the meantime, though, some people might continue to respond to his haircut the way U.S. player Frances Tiafoe did when asked about it by a reporter following his first-round victory over Yoshihito Nishioka.

“It’s definitely terrible,” Tiafoe said with a laugh. “He’s my guy, though. It’s funny. I looked at him and I was like, ‘I guess you’re aerodynamic’ … I don’t know who told him to do that, but it’s terrible. From a guy who gets haircuts week in, week out and prides myself on good haircuts, it’s horrendous.”

Alcaraz also laughed when he was asked about Tiafoe’s comment.

“I know he’s lying,” Alcaraz said. “He likes the haircut. He likes it, he told me.”

Others might react like Irish golfer Rory McIlroy, who expressed his full support for the radical change atop Alcaraz’s head while meeting with the Spaniard earlier Monday.

“I like it,” McIlroy told him. “It’s good. It’s a good look.”

Overall, Alcaraz told reporters, reactions have been mixed — and he really doesn’t care either way.

“Some people like it. Some people don’t like it,” he said. “To be honest, I’m just laughing about the reaction of the people. It is what it is. So I can’t do anything else right now, so I’m just laughing about everything that they are talking about my haircut.”

NEW YORK — Even at age 45, even after two years away from Grand Slam tennis, Venus Williams displayed some big serves and powerful groundstrokes at the U.S. Open on Monday night in front of a supportive crowd at Arthur Ashe Stadium, before losing 6-3, 2-6, 6-1 to Karolina Muchova.

Williams was the oldest singles player at the hard-court tournament since Renee Richards was 47 in 1981.

“She’s such a legend of our sport,” 2023 French Open runner-up Muchova said about seven-time Grand Slam singles champion Williams, adding that it was an honor “to share a court with her.”

In just the fourth match of a comeback that began last month after more than a year off the tour, Williams didn’t exactly get to ease into things Monday: Muchova, a 29-year-old from the Czech Republic, was seeded 11th in New York and made it to the semifinals there in both 2023 — when she lost to eventual champion Coco Gauff in a match interrupted by a climate protest — and 2024.

Karolina Muchova, left, shakes hands with Venus Williams after their first-round match at the U.S. Open on Monday.

(Adam Hunger / Associated Press)

So perhaps it wasn’t surprising that Williams started slowly, ceding 11 of the initial 13 points and falling behind 2-0. With members of the crowd shouting, “Let’s go, Venus!” and roaring after her winners — and her fiance, Andrea Preti, leaping out of his seat — Williams took three games in a row to go ahead 3-2

Muchova grabbed the next four games to claim that set, which ended with Williams hitting four of her evening’s 10 double-faults to get broken.

But Williams, who smacked serves at up to 114 mph and finished with just one fewer winner than Muchova, broke to begin the second set on her way to tying the match.

In the third set, though, as the contest reached two hours, Muchova was simply too good.

When the match ended, Williams left the court with a wave as fans rose to salute someone whose first U.S. Open title arrived a full quarter of a century ago.

More recently, Williams was off the tennis tour for 16 months until entering a tournament in Washington last month, where she won one match each in singles and doubles. She hadn’t competed anywhere since the Miami Open in March 2024, and had surgery for uterine fibroids later last year.

The U.S. Tennis Association awarded wild cards to Williams for both the mixed doubles event last week and singles.

She hasn’t won a match at the U.S. Open in singles since 2019, when she got to the second round. Since then, Williams exited in the first round in 2020, 2022 and 2023, and missed the tournament in 2021 and 2024.

Venus Williams returns a shot to Karolina Muchova during the first round of the U.S. Open on Monday.

(Adam Hunger / Associated Press)

She won singles championships at Flushing Meadows in 2000 and 2001, and another five at Wimbledon.

Since making her professional debut in 1994, Williams also collected 14 Grand Slam trophies in women’s doubles alongside her younger sister, Serena, plus two in mixed doubles, earned a record five Olympic tennis medals and reached No. 1 in the WTA rankings.

Through the years, both siblings transcended their sport and became much more than successful athletes. Serena, who won 23 Grand Slam singles titles, played her last match at the 2022 U.S. Open.

“She’s Venus Williams. She’s so iconic in so many different ways,” said Frances Tiafoe, an American player who won his first-round match in Ashe earlier Monday. “She’s won so much. And to see how much she loves game still at her age is amazing. It’s amazing to still see her out here.”

It was at the U.S. Open more than a decade ago that Williams revealed she had been diagnosed with Sjögren’s syndrome, an energy-sapping auto-immune disease that can cause joint pain.

Some thought she might leave her sport because of that, but she remained a leading figure — on and off the court. To her fans — for years, and certainly on Monday night — it never mattered that she now has exited in the first or second round in each of her past 13 appearances at major tournaments.

When she was asked at the Washington tournament in July why she was still competing, she offered a simple reply: “Why not?”

“I want to be my best, and that’s the expectation I have for myself: to get the best out of me. And that’s all any player can ask for,” Williams said Saturday, the day before the start of singles play at the U.S. Open. “I haven’t played as much as the other players, so it’s a different challenge when you’re dealing with that. So I’m just trying to have fun, stay relaxed and be my personal best.”

Fendrich writes for the Associated Press.

Daniil Medvedev reacts next to chair umpire Greg Allensworth after a photographer ran onto the court Sunday in New York.

(Adam Hunger / Associated Press)

The rematch initially appeared as if it was going to be a quicker upset than the first time around. Bonzi won the first two sets and was up 5-4 and serving for match point in the third … when all hell broke loose.

Bonzi missed on his first serve and was preparing for his second when he was interrupted. A photographer who apparently thought the match was over had stepped onto the court and was immediately reprimanded over the loudspeaker by chair umpire Greg Allensworth.

Allensworth then announced that Bonzi would be given another chance at his first serve “because of the delay caused by an outside interference.”

The decision appears to be based on a USTA tournament regulation which states that if there is a delay between the first and second serves, “the server gets two serves if the delay was caused by the receiver or if there was outside interference.”

The announcement drew a negative response from the crowd, which Medvedev encouraged by using arm gestures. He then started berating Allensworth, seeming to ask him, “Are you a man?” more than once before leaning into the microphone behind the chair to address the crowd.

“He wants to go home, guys,” Medvedev said. “He doesn’t like to be here. He gets paid by the match, not by the hour.”

He also yelled, “What did Reilly Opelka say?” at least three times, in reference to the U.S. player who was fined by the ATP Tour earlier this year after referring to Allensworth as the “worst ump on tour. ”

Medvedev later told reporters that he was upset with Allensworth’s ruling because he didn’t think the photographer had caused enough of a delay to warrant a repeat first serve.

As he returned to the court, Medvedev continued to motion for the crowd to voice its displeasure. Many of the fans complied, with TV footage showing a lot of them appearing to be more amused than enraged by the situation.

After about two minutes, Allensworth asked for order so Bonzi could serve. When that didn’t work, Medvedev started motioning for the spectators to quiet down. They didn’t, and Medvedev appeared to enjoy the lengthy disruption, at one point blowing kisses toward the stands.

“I just expressed my emotions, my unhappiness with the decision,” Medvedev said later. “And then the crowd did what they did without me, without me asking them too much. And it was fun to witness.”

Bonzi appeared to be on the verge of serving several times before stopping because of the noise.

“Every time I went on the line to serve and every time I did that, everyone was booing. I felt I didn’t do anything bad in the match to, like, receive this treatment, and I didn’t want to serve in those conditions,” Bonzi said. “So I was waiting.”

After a delay of roughly six minutes, Bonzi finally served — and missed again, much to the audible delight of the crowd. He got the second serve over the net but lost the point after a lengthy volley.