Aryna Sabalenka did not just win a tennis match. She kept a dynasty alive.
Under the lights at Flushing Meadows, with most of the noise rolling against her, the two-time defending champion rode out a wild, awkward, occasionally nervy night to beat American Taylor Townsend 6-4 6-3 and reach a sixth straight US Open quarter-final.
That run puts her in rare air. The last woman to string together six consecutive quarter-finals here was Serena Williams, back in 2016. Sabalenka is now walking directly in those footsteps – and closing fast on another of Williams’ markers. No woman has won three US Open titles in a row since the six-time champion did it. Sabalenka is three victories from matching her.
For now, she has 18 straight wins in New York and a three-year unbeaten streak at this tournament. The numbers are cold. The match was anything but.
Sabalenka bends, then bites back
The opening games were chaos. Five straight breaks of serve, both players cracking returns, neither able to settle. Sabalenka’s power met Townsend’s variety and touch, and the scoreboard lurched like a tightrope.
Eventually the top seed steadied first. She began to find her range on the forehand, began to land the first serve, began to drive Townsend back. Even then, the American refused to fade. Sabalenka needed a second attempt to serve out the opening set, dragged into longer exchanges by a player who refused to play the points on her terms.
Townsend, a doubles specialist with a flair for the theatrical, walked on court in a long, black-feathered outfit and then played with the same sense of show. She chipped, charged, redirected. She made Sabalenka hit one more ball, then another, then one she really did not want to hit.
The reward came early in the second set. Sabalenka dropped serve and trailed 3-1, the crowd roaring for the underdog, the energy suddenly tilting hard to the American side.
That was the moment that has undone Sabalenka in the past. Not this time.
Aware she must win the title to have any chance of holding on to the world No 1 ranking, she broke back to love with a ruthless game that felt like a line in the sand. From there, she surged. The last five games were a sprint to the tape: Sabalenka lost just five points in that stretch, hammering returns, cleaning up short balls and shutting down any hope of a late twist.
After 75 minutes, Townsend’s resistance snapped. Sabalenka’s campaign rolled on.
“I was just trying to stay focused on myself, not only point by point but ball by ball,” she said afterwards. “I’m happy I was able to turn around the second set, I think it was a key moment.”
This was not her cleanest performance, but it was one of her most controlled. In a hostile environment, against an opponent feeding off the noise, she held her nerve. For a player whose temper and tension have sometimes betrayed her on big stages, that matters.
She knew it too. And she made sure to acknowledge the opponent who had pushed her.
“What an incredible player she is, approaching the net, a great returner, moving well, very brave,” Sabalenka said of Townsend. “You can see how focused she was. It was really challenging playing her, especially here.
“Thank you so much [to the crowd] for being so respectful to me. I knew coming into this match that you guys would be on her side, but you were sometimes cheering for me and I really appreciate that.”
Fortress Flushing, but pressure building
Sabalenka has turned these courts into familiar ground. She has not failed to reach the semi-finals at the US Open since 2020, a run of consistency that underpins her rise as a four-time major champion.
Yet there is a sharper edge to this fortnight. A fourth-round exit at Wimbledon still lingers, and she has not yet lifted a major trophy this season. If she falls short in New York, it will be her first year without a Slam since 2022.
The stakes are clear: title or bust for both her season and, potentially, her ranking.
Noskova survives a marathon and sets up a blockbuster
Wimbledon champion Linda Noskova will stand across the net in the quarter-finals after surviving a draining, see-saw battle with Marta Kostyuk, finally closing out a 7-5 5-7 6-4 win on her sixth match point.
The Czech sixth seed, just 21, lived every point. She served for the match in the second set at 5-3, held two match points, and saw Kostyuk claw her way back to force a decider. What should have been a straightforward finish turned into a test of nerve and patience.
The final set mirrored the tension of the night. Breaks were traded, momentum flipped. Again Noskova nudged ahead 5-3, again the door refused to close. She missed two more match points, let Kostyuk drag her to deuce, then squandered a fifth chance after saving a break point.
By the time she finally converted the sixth, more than two and a half hours had passed. Noskova dropped to her haunches, the release obvious.
“I am more than relieved, this match was so tough, emotionally a bit more than physically,” she admitted. “Today was very close, it could have ended both ways. With all the chances I had in the second set, it was tough to still kind of restart.”
Restart she did, and now she walks into a quarter-final against the most dominant player this tournament has seen in three years.
Sabalenka, at home on these hard courts, chasing history. Noskova, fresh from Wimbledon glory and hardened by a New York marathon.
One of them will move a step closer to a title that could reshape the season. The other will walk away knowing exactly how far the bar has been raised.
