Venus Williams held seven set points against Sofia Kenin and won none of them. Three came in a row on Kenin’s serve at 6-5 in the second set. Four more came in the tiebreak, where Williams was 6-2 up and one point from forcing a decider. She got none of them, and Kenin closed out a 6-2, 7-6(6) win in the first round of the US Open.

The match did not start until 12:13 a.m. on Monday and did not finish until 2:01 a.m., the latest first-round conclusion in tournament history. Novak Djokovic’s four-hour, 36-minute loss to Mariano Navone on Arthur Ashe Stadium had pushed the schedule deep into the night.

Williams, playing her 26th US Open on a wild card, has now lost 15 singles matches in a row, a run going back to Washington in July 2025. Her singles record for 2026 stands at 0-13. Her last win at a Grand Slam came at Wimbledon in 2021, over Mihaela Buzarnescu.

Kenin came back from 2-6 down in the tiebreak

Kenin, the 2020 Australian Open champion and the same year’s French Open finalist, arrived at Flushing Meadows 6-20 in singles for the season. She broke Williams twice in the first three games and needed 32 minutes to take the opener.

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The second set turned when Williams broke back and held serve to 5-5. Three set points on Kenin’s serve at 6-5 came and went. In the tiebreak she went 6-2 ahead, four more set points, and still could not close it out. Kenin held her serves and won the last six points to close out the tiebreak 8-6.

Kenin plays third seed Jessica Pegula in the second round, after Pegula’s 6-3, 6-2 win over Elena-Gabriela Ruse.

A doubles run with Serena to come

Williams is not done at Flushing Meadows. She is entered in the women’s doubles with her sister Serena Williams, the pair awarded a wild card into what is their first US Open together since 2022. The sisters lost their opening match on their comeback at the Cincinnati Open on 17 August, 6-2, 1-6, 10-8, to Peyton Stearns and Marta Kostyuk.

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