Carlos Alcaraz and Ben Shelton played out arguably the best match of the US Open in the quarter finals, but it’s received a backlash due to how late it went.
Alcaraz and Shelton did not enter the court until 11pm due to Frances Tiafoe vs Alex Michelsen going the full five sets on Arthur Ashe Stadium.
Shelton and Alcaraz followed suit by playing out a five-set epic and Shelton did not win the deciding tie-break until after 3:30am in New York.
Fans and pundits were far from happy with the developments, suggesting it is not healthy for the players to play so late, or fair to expect spectators to stick around until the early hours of the morning.
Marion Bartoli has suggested the US Open plays big matches on both courts, while others have suggested scrapping the night session altogether.
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Craig Tiley, who is head of the USTA and oversees the US Open, has shunned ideas of getting rid of the night session in New York however.
In an interview with Sky Sports, Tiley responded with a strong statement after complaints to the late-night finish between Alcaraz and Shelton.
“I hear from a lot of people that it finishes too late and then I say, okay, and your suggestion is? I don’t get anything,” said the US Open chief.
“You can’t control the length of the match. What’s really interesting is in the last 10 years the amount of tennis from when you hit a point to when a point stops has been about the same.
“But the length of the matches on the men’s side has increased by an average of about 25 minutes. That’s because we now have the shot clock so everyone is taking their time, and we have the towels here which takes a bit more time and so the whole length of it is a bit longer.
“Not that much longer, but in fact the average time of the men’s matches today is still not in the top four average times in the last 10 years. While it feels really late, the reality is you’ve got to go and look at the data, But that being said, no one wants to finish at 3.30am in the morning, although the rest of the world in the daytime saw a pretty amazing match.
“We really like the two days and two nights. Two full sessions and you get a women’s match and a great men’s match, and that’s what our fans are telling us.
“They can come out and see three, four, five hours of entertainment and if it goes really long like the other night, that’s a great sporting ticket so I will keep it.”
The US Open has finished past 2am several times over the last fornite and one of the biggest criticisers of the late-night finishes has been Martina Navratilova.
“Something has got to give… this is not ok and it is not normal … no other sport might start at 11 AM or 11 PM. In the same event,” said the multi-time Grand Slam champion after Alcaraz’s match with Shelton.
