Ukrainian Yelena Svitolina, seeded ninth, bid farewell to the US Open Tennis Championship (Flushing Meadows), the last of the four Grand Slam tournaments of the current season, in the third round, after losing on Saturday morning to Russian Anna Kalinskaya, with a score of 3-6, 2-6, 3-6.
Svitolina was joined by Czech Karolina Muchova, ranked seventh in the world, who also bid farewell to the tournament at the hands of American Emma Navarro, ranked twenty-sixth.
Czech Linda Noskova, the 2026 Wimbledon champion, continued her successful journey in New York, after defeating American Anne Lee, seeded twenty-ninth, with a score of 6-2, 7-6, 6-2, to reach the fourth round of the US Open for the first time in her fifth participation in the tournament.
Noskova achieved 9 victories in her last 10 matches against players from the top 50 seeds, and her only loss during this series was against American Amanda Anisimova in Cincinnati. In the round of 16, she will face Ukrainian Marta Kostyuk, seeded eleventh, who defeated Russian Ekaterina Alexandrova, seeded 18th, with a score of 6-3, 6-2.
American Taylor Townsend also continued her successful journey, after she defeated Russian Diana Schneider, seeded fifteenth, 6-2, 7-6, 7-6, in a match that lasted two hours and 27 minutes, to reach the fourth round at the US Open for the second year in a row.
In the women's doubles competitions, sisters Venus and Serena Williams, during their return to doubles competition, lost to 14th seeds Taiwanese Chan Hao-ching and Australian Maya Joynt 3-6, 7-6 (6-8), 6-7 (10-7) on Friday in the first round, in a marathon confrontation that lasted 3 hours.
The two legends who lit up Arthur Ashe Stadium own 14 major women's doubles titles, including two titles in this tournament.
Venus (46 years old) and Serena (44 years old) played a major women's doubles tournament for the first time since 2022, and their recent victory together is due to one of the major titles of the 2018 edition of the Roland Garros tournament.
Serena, who has won 23 major singles titles, returned from a 4-year retirement to play in the last edition of Wimbledon, the third major tournament.
After losing the first set, they recovered in the second, which they won in a tie-break.
The two sisters were able to fight back the break in the third set, and led 5-0 in the 10-point tiebreak in the final set, before losing the match.
Hao-qing and Joint led 4-2 in the deciding set, before the Williams sisters equalized, then lost a tiebreaker.
The winner, Joynt, said after the match: “The atmosphere was surreal, because we were able to play against two legends in tennis, and this is very exceptional.”
Liverpool's Dutch captain Virgil van Dijk said that the level of his teammate Alexander Isak was never in doubt, after the Swede led the Reds with his double to achieve their first win in an official match under the leadership of Spaniard Andoni Iraola against Ipswich.
Isaac scored both goals in the 2-0 victory on Friday in the first ten minutes of the match, raising his tally this season to three goals from three matches.
After moving from Newcastle a year ago for a record deal (shared with the deal of Argentine Enzo Fernandez to Chelsea) in the league amounting to 125 million pounds ($169 million), he suffered in his first season with Liverpool from problems in physical readiness and injuries.
He has already equaled his tally of goals in the Premier League last season, and Van Dijk is confident that his colleague will return to the level that made him one of the most sought-after strikers in the world.
Van Dijk told Sky Sports: “I don’t think his level was ever in doubt for us.”
He added: “Last year, he suffered a bad, unfortunate injury, and it depended on him, thanks to the hard work he put in every day, to return as quickly as possible.”
He continued: “I think he had a very good World Cup, and a pre-season period as well, and now he is ready to pick up the pace.”
He added: “We saw how good he was when we faced him (against Newcastle), and now he will show the world his abilities while wearing a Liverpool shirt as well.”
The Swede was absent from the field for three months last season after breaking his fibula, and he hopes that he has finally turned the page on a difficult first year as a player in the ranks of the 20-time league winner.
“It wasn't easy, of course,” Isaac said. “It was a long injury, and a difficult season in general.”
He added: “I was thinking first about having a good World Cup, then starting well this season, which I feel I have achieved now.”
Portuguese coach Jose Mourinho, Real Madrid's coach, confirmed that he did not find an explanation for his team's loss to Real Betis with an unanswered goal on Friday evening in the Spanish League, pointing out that his team played a great match, was the better team, and clearly deserved to win.
Real Madrid suffered its first defeat in the current season, falling to its host Real Betis 0-1 on Friday evening in the fourth round of the Spanish Football League.
The goalless draw dominated the outcome of the match until the 81st minute, when Troy Parrott snatched the fatal winning goal for Betis.
It seemed that the Royal Club was on its way to grabbing an exciting draw when newcomer Carlos Espe scored a goal three minutes before the end, but the referee canceled the goal after returning to the Video Assistant Referee (VAR) technology.
In stoppage time for the match, the referee awarded a penalty kick in favor of Real Madrid, but French sniper Kylian Mbappe missed it.
Mourinho said after the match: “Sometimes you lose, and you don’t know why? Or how do you explain it? The team played a great match, and we were the dominant side. The defense line also played a strong match and controlled almost everything. We created a lot of chances, and if the match had ended in a draw, we would have felt frustrated, because we gave more, so imagine how we feel after the defeat!”
He added: “I think we had possession of the ball, even though possession meant nothing, and we created a lot of chances. “Maybe we shot 10, 15 or 18 times, I don’t know, and we wasted three chances, while the opposing team’s goalkeeper made 4 great saves.”
He explained in statements to the official website of Real Madrid: “I do not know why we lost, and I cannot justify it.”
Mourinho touched on his description of Real Madrid players as “naive” compared to Betis players, explaining that he did not mean their lack of intelligence on the field, but rather their different dealings with the referee’s decisions. Pointing out that Betis players tried to influence the referee in the simplest details.
Mourinho refused to hold the referee responsible for the defeat, stressing that he had not seen in detail the controversial cases related to the penalty kick, its re-execution, and the goal scored by Carlos Espe. He said that he prefers a referee who allows play to continue, and will not use arbitral decisions to justify the loss.
Mourinho praised Espy, considering him a player “with great potential,” stressing that he did his best and scored a goal before it was cancelled.
Regarding the penalty kick missed by Frenchman Kylian Mbappe, Mourinho stressed that the player should not be held responsible, explaining: “When a player goes to take a penalty kick, we all go with him,” confirming that he bears collective responsibility for the result.
Mourinho's team failed to achieve its first victory at Betis in La Liga since 2021, after three draws and a loss. He continued: “I have nothing to blame my players for. "We may have deserved to win, but that doesn't give you any points." This loss for Los Blancos comes four days before the opening of its Champions League campaign, when it hosts Inter Milan on Tuesday at the Santiago Bernabeu Stadium, seeking to win its 16th title.
