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For two decades, one of the biggest certainties in tennis was that one of the Big Three—Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer, and Rafael Nadal—was going to walk out of a Grand Slam as champion. But with two of the three retired and Djokovic entering his twilight, perhaps the more sustainable certainty is the disagreements between tennis players and tournament organizers on the schedule.
There’s a wide range of schedule disagreements, from the timing of matches at the French Open to the required number of tournaments in any given year. The 2025 US Open, the year’s final Grand Slam on the calendar, is no different.
This is the first time that the US Open has begun on a Sunday instead of Monday. It’s also the third Grand Slam to move to a Sunday start, as the French Open led the way in 2006, followed by the Australian Open last year.
Wimbledon is the only Grand Slam remaining that still starts on a Monday.
The logic from the US Open organizers is clear: The event now runs for 15 days instead of 14, allowing for additional ticket sales—a year after it broke its attendance record. It also adds an extra weekend day that could boost ratings, even for Round 1 matches, especially with the NFL Week 3 preseason games done by Saturday this year.
But the players are not exactly happy with the change.
“I’m not really for it. I don’t think a lot of the players were for it, especially those who play the week before a Slam,” world No. 4 women’s player Jessica Pegula said.
Both Pegula and fellow American star Frances Tiafoe said that they understand the reasoning is related to extra ticket sales. Pegula added that players often voice their complaints to organizers, but “they don’t listen to anything we say.”
The US Open starts more than a month after the end of Wimbledon, the closest Grand Slam on the calendar. But there are several top-tier tournaments in between, including 1000-level events like the Canadian Open and Cincinnati Open, and the lone combined 500-level tournament, the DC Open.
The US Open starts less than a week after the final of the Cincinnati Open, a combined 1000-level event. Carlos Alcaraz, the defending US Open men’s singles champion, won the Cincinnati Open on Monday—then competed in the US Open Mixed Doubles championship the next day in New York City.
While the schedule is an issue, the players have no complaints about the US Open’s growing prize money. This year’s purse is $85 million—the largest of any Grand Slam—with the men’s and women’s singles champions taking $5 million each.
