Japanese fourth seed Kei Nishikori, last year’s runner-up, crashed out Monday in the first round of the US Open while Serena Williams’ path to tennis history lost several major obstacles.
Upset alert: @benoitpaire saves 2 match points to beat Nishikori 64 36 46 76(6) 64. More: http://t.co/HZX41hnwih #ATP pic.twitter.com/u1Fzuwb9Ou
The year’s final Grand Slam tournament began with drama on the Flushing Meadows hardcourts as 41st-ranked Frenchman Benoit Paire saved two match points and rallied to defeat Nishikori 6-4, 3-6, 4-6, 7-6 (8/6), 6-4.
Top-10 women’s seeds Ana Ivanovic, Karolina Pliskova and Carla Suarez Navarro exited with opening-match losses, leaving 12th seed Belinda Bencic as the top-rated foe in Williams’ half of the draw.
Three-time defending champion Williams, who lost to Bencic in a Toronto semi-final, could face the Swiss teen again in the quarter-finals.
Williams is chasing the first calendar Grand Slam since Steffi Graf in 1988 and a 22nd career major title to match Graf’s Open Era record.
Paire, who had never before beaten a top-five foe, fired 21 aces to only three for Nishikori and blasted 64 winners, 30 more than Nishikori, with 67 unforced errors, 31 more than the Asian number one.
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Nishikori led the tie-breaker 6-4 but swatted a forehand long, watched Paire smack two service winners and then netted a forehand to force a fifth set.
Paire, who won his first ATP title last month at Bastad, broke for a 3-2 lead and held to the finish after three hours and 14 minutes.
Marin Cilic won his opener 6-3, 7-6 (7/3), 7-6 (7/3) over Argentine qualifier Guido Pella.
On the women’s side, Slovakia’s 50th-ranked Dominika Cibulkova ousted seventh-seeded Ivanovic 6-3, 3-6, 6-3, delivering the Serb star’s first US Open first-match exit since 2009.
After the injury-forced withdrawal of Russian third seed Maria Sharapova, Ivanovic had been Williams’ top-ranked rival.
With ivanovic, Suarez-Navarro, Sharapova & Pliskova out of #USOpen, Serena Williams will not have to play a top 10 player to reach the final
— Randy Walker (@TennisPublisher) August 31, 2015
That status fell to Czech eighth seed Pliskova, who lost to American Anna Tatishvili 6-2, 6-1, and to 10th seed Suarez Navarro, who lost to Czech Denisa Allertova 6-1, 7-6 (7/5).
One Williams rival who advanced was her older sister Venus, a seven-time Grand Slam champion and US 23rd seed who outlasted Puerto Rico’s Monica Puig 6-4, 6-7 (7/9), 6-3.
Venus could play Bencic in round three. World number one Djokovic meets Brazil’s Joao Souza while Spanish eighth seed Nadal, a possible quarter-final foe for Djokovic, faces Croatia’s Borna Coric, who won their first meeting last year at Basel.