Serena Williams getting back on the court at the U.S. Open after a four-year absence and Carlos Alcaraz returning to competitive tennis after being out the past four months with injury brought cheers and nostalgia to the Grand Slam tournament.

The celebration was short-lived.

After winning their debut playing together, Williams and Alcaraz got knocked out in the mixed doubles quarterfinals by Belinda Bencic and Flavio Cobolli 5-4 (4), 4-1 on Tuesday (August 27, 2026).

Before the match, Cobolli called their opponents “the queen of tennis and the king of now.”

The star-studded duo with a combined eight U.S. Open singles championships certainly earned that praise. Williams and Alcaraz bounced back from a slow start in the first round to defeat Erin Routliffe and Lloyd Glasspool 5-3, 4-1, much to the delight of fans inside Arthur Ashe Stadium who were clearly on their side.

“I never expected to be back on this court,” Williams said after her first match at Flushing Meadows since 2022. “I never thought this would happen.”

Now the question is whether she will seek an encore performance in women’s doubles alongside her older sister Venus. They won the U.S. Open twice among their 14 Grand Slam doubles titles together.

Serena, who is back playing tennis at age 44, does not plan to play singles.

Vintage shots

Williams in her latest mixed doubles cameo — she won the U.S. Open with Max Mirnyi in 1998 — hit some vintage shots that looked straight out of her prime.

Early on, she carried Alcaraz, the 23-year-old defending champion who’s ranked third in the world in men’s singles and was clearly rusty in his first competitive action since April 14.

“I think everybody could see: I double-faulted on the first point,” said Alcaraz, who missed the French Open and Wimbledon because of a right wrist injury and wore a sleeve on that arm. “I was really, really nervous. I was out for four months … I almost forget how it feels.”

Fans chanted, “Come on, Carlos!” and “Let’s go, Serena, let’s go!” But the pair was overpowered by Bencic and Cobolli, letting a first-set tiebreaker slip away and getting dominated in the second.

Cobolli acknowledged being tight because Williams and Alcaraz were on the other side. Bencic said Williams tried to intimidate her — by saying she speaks Italian better.

“It was surreal to play against Carlos,” Bencic said. “Sometimes I was just standing at the volley or the return, and I was like, How did I end up on this court?’ I don’t really know. Just a huge honor. Obviously you can feel both of their auras.”

Djokovic, Sabalenka stunned

Top seeds Novak Djokovic and ​Aryna Sabalenka crashed out earlier against the experienced doubles players Henry Patten and Katerina Siniakova, losing 1-4 4-2 10-2, as Siniakova sealed the ‌upset in style with an ace out wide on match point.

The tournament was overhauled last year in an effort to get more top singles players to compete. It was moved to a two-day event well before the singles main draw begins, with a scoring format that guarantees quick matches that shouldn’t tax the players too much.

The matches in the first three rounds feature sets to four games, with a tiebreaker at 4-all and a 10-point tiebreaker instead of a third set. Only the final will resemble a regular match, with traditional sets to six games.

“I will say if we play until basically regular rules, until six games, will be much more difficult,” Mensik said.

Sabalenka, the two-time defending U.S. Open women’s champion, and 24-time Grand Slam champion Djokovic are exactly the types of players the U.S. Tennis Association was seeking. They had the No. 1 seed based on the lowest combined singles ranking of any team, but their loss was far from an upset.

Spouses Svitolina and Monfils reach semis

Elina Svitolina and Gael Monfils have both gone far but never all the way to the U.S. Open title. Maybe the married couple can finally win a trophy together.

The spouses made quite a pair on the court Tuesday, becoming the first team into the mixed doubles semifinals by edging Katerina Siniakova and Henry Patten 5-4 (6), 4-5 (3) (10-8).

Svitolina and Monfils will face Bencic and Cobolli in one semifinal on Wednesday, with Mirra Andreeva and Andrey Rublev to meet Karolina Muchova and Jakub Mensik in the other. The winning team will earn $1 million.

That would be quite a payday for Monfils to share with his wife in his final Grand Slam tournament before retiring.

“Happy wife, happy life,” Monfils said in their postmatch interview after a kiss and hug on the court.

Published – August 26, 2026 01:10 pm IST

Serena Williams returns a shot against Marta Kostyuk and Peyton Stearns during a women’s doubles match at the Cincinnati Open tennis tournament. File
| Photo Credit: AP