Mumbai: Qinwen Zheng was jealous of the players who always play on the bigger courts of Grand Slams. As a former Grand Slam finalist and the reigning Olympic singles champion, the Chinese had been there too. Not in the last few Slams, however, as her ranking nosedived after being away with a chronic elbow injury.
She returned in September, but stepped away again. And she scripted one of the week’s biggest turnarounds, erasing a 5-0 deficit in the deciding set to stun Keys 1-6, 7-6(3), 7-5 in the third round. At 5-0 down, Zheng found her hitting range again, and Keys lost her first serves. In the men’s draw, Carlos Alcaraz continued to motor along with a 6-3, 6-4, 6-1 victory over China’s Wu Yibing in the third round.
“The second time I came back, it was hard, because I totally lost the dynamic of how to compete as an athlete,” said Zheng.
Playing with persistent pain on her right elbow last year, Zheng underwent surgery in July. On Saturday, Zheng was back out there, as a qualifier taking on American Madison Keys on Grandstand, the US Open’s third biggest court.
This is your ranking.
“I spoke with my team, and my coach told me, ‘Okay, this is what you have. You need to fight like it’s the beginning of your career’,” Zheng said after her second-round win.
