Aryna Sabalenka’s title defence briefly turned surreal on Louis Armstrong Stadium, but not for anything happening on the scoreboard.
Up 3-0 in the opening set against Kamilla Rakhimova, the top seed suddenly walked towards the chair and made her point clear to umpire Eva Asderaki-Moore: “Someone is smoking weed.” The Belarusian gestured towards the stands, insisting the smell was “so strong” it was cutting through the New York night.
Asderaki-Moore radioed an official and mimed a smoking motion towards the area behind her. No formal announcement followed, no delay beyond a brief pause. The match went on. So did Sabalenka.
Once the distraction drifted away, the tennis took over.
The two-time defending champion locked straight back into her familiar, ruthless rhythm, completing a 6-3 6-4 win that looked every bit as controlled as the scoreline suggests. It was her 16th consecutive victory at Flushing Meadows, a run that has turned this hard-court major into her personal stronghold.
She is now three wins from a historic hat-trick. No woman has won three US Open singles titles in a row since Serena Williams dominated from 2012 to 2014. Sabalenka is hunting that company, and she is doing it with the kind of authority that makes opponents feel the match might already be half gone in the warm-up.
From the first ball, her trademark power set the tone. The 28-year-old dropped just four points on serve in a one-sided opening set, bullying Rakhimova off the baseline and dictating almost every rally. Her first strike off both wings pinned the Uzbek-born player back, the ball exploding off the strings and rushing through the court.
Rakhimova refused to fold. In the second set she dug in, held serve with more conviction and finally started landing a few heavier blows of her own. The rallies lengthened, the resistance stiffened. For a few games, Sabalenka had to think, not just hit.
The pressure, though, sat squarely on Rakhimova’s shoulders every time Sabalenka stepped to the line. The top seed’s serve never blinked. Ten aces to Rakhimova’s two told part of the story; the rest was in the numbers that don’t always make the highlight reel. Sabalenka did not face a single break point. Not one.
At 4-4 in the second set, the gap in class reappeared at the crucial moment. Sabalenka pounced for the decisive break to move 5-4 ahead, then served out the match with the calm of a player who has done this under New York’s lights many times before.
The cannabis issue, though, is not an isolated subplot at this tournament. Sabalenka joined a growing list of players to complain about the smell drifting across the courts at Flushing Meadows. In the opening week, Britain’s Katie Boulter called it “distracting”, while compatriots Harriet Dart and Francesca Jones also remarked on the odour. In previous years, stars such as Novak Djokovic and Alexander Zverev have voiced similar frustrations.
Smoking is banned on site, but the grounds sit next to Corona Park, where cannabis is legal for adults aged 21 and over. When the wind shifts, the scent sometimes follows, seeping into the stadiums and practice courts and adding an odd, hazy edge to elite sport.
Sabalenka pushed it aside. She had more important business.
With the win, she moves into the fourth round still looking every inch the woman to beat. Next up is a different kind of test: either American crowd favourite Taylor Townsend, whose touch and doubles instincts can disrupt any rhythm, or Russian 15th seed Diana Shnaider — the player who stunned Sabalenka in the French Open quarter-finals in June.
Revenge or a partisan New York crowd. Power versus guile or power against the woman who last solved her puzzle.
Either way, the champion’s path is starting to tighten, and the stakes are rising with every cleanly struck ace.
