Tennis Briefing: Venus Williams returns and Canadian Open withdrawals

New York Times

6 days ago

Welcome back to the Monday Tennis Briefing, where The Athletic will explain the stories behind the stories from the past week on court.
This week, a player who once declared he hated playing on clay wins his first title on the red stuff, there are more withdrawals ahead of the Canadian Open and all eyes will be on a 45-year-old Venus Williams as she competes for the first time since the 2024 Miami Open.
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Of all the players competing in tennis around the world this week, none will attract anything like the attention of an unranked veteran launching a comeback in Washington D.C.
Venus Williams, who turned 45 last month and had been listed as inactive by the WTA after not playing an event for more than a year, is back.
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She will compete in both singles and doubles at the Citi D.C. Open, beginning in the latter today (Monday) with partner Hailey Baptiste, who at 23 is almost half her age. They'll take on 2014 Wimbledon singles finalist Eugenie Bouchard — who recently announced she'll retire, aged 31, at the Canadian Open starting next week in her homeland — and Clervie Ngounoue, who was just shy of two years old when Williams won the last of her seven Grand Slams at Wimbledon in 2008.
Williams' return does not appear to be a one-tournament-only kind of thing. She has hired well-respected veteran coach Nick Saviano and seems to be targeting a run of events in the lead-up to the U.S. Open, which she won in 2000 and 2001.
'I definitely feel I'll play well. I'm still the same player. I'm a big hitter. This is my brand,' Williams said in a news conference Sunday. 'I'm just here for now, and who knows?'
When asked why she had chosen to return in her mid-forties, Williams' answer was simple: 'Why not?'
She plays her first singles match since that Miami Open 16 months ago on Tuesday, against world No.35 Peyton Stearns.
Charlie Eccleshare
For most on tour, the second half of a summer means the hard-court swing in North America. So how to make sense of this month's post-Wimbledon clay events around Europe in Gstaad, Bastad, Umag and Kitzbühel?
That said, those tournaments have traditionally been an opportunity for Casper Ruud to rack up rankings points.
The world No.12 doesn't care much for the grass, unless he is hitting golf balls along it. In the past, he has shown up at Wimbledon having not played any grass-court tennis but seen his favorite musical artist, The Weeknd, perform multiple times.
That didn't happen this year, though. Ruud suffered a knee injury at the French Open in May after playing through pain for some time and chose to skip the grass season entirely. Then he lost in the quarterfinals of the EFG Swiss Open in Gstaad on Friday, to Juan Martin Cerundolo — aka the lesser and younger of the sport's two Cerundolo brothers, compared to 19th-ranked sibling Francisco, and the world No.81.
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Ruud is holding steady in the ATP table, thanks to his title win in Madrid in the run-up to Roland-Garros. He also doesn't have much in the way of points to defend for the rest of the season, other than reaching the last 16 at the U.S. Open in September and the semis of November's Tour Finals, if he can even make it there.
Still, there have been years when Ruud has run the table on the summer clay. Hopefully his knee allows him to have some success on the hard courts the rest of the way.
Matt Futterman
Alexander Bublik, who once declared 'I hate clay, I hate this surface,' has his first title on the red stuff, defeating Juan Manuel Cerundolo on Sunday in Gstaad.
This apparent contradiction is entirely in keeping with Bublik's personality and follows him reaching a first-ever Grand Slam quarterfinal, also on his least-favorite surface, at the French Open last month.
On grass, his favorite surface, he exited Wimbledon in the first round — though he did win the Halle Open on the green stuff in the lead-up to London. All in all, it's been a superb couple of months for the 28-year-old, who is up to No.30 in the rankings, having been No.76 as recently as early May.
Bublik, Russian-born but now representing neighboring Kazakhstan, was close to quitting tennis altogether this time a year ago, when he struggled for motivation and lost his love for the sport. Now, he is one of the most dangerous players on the tour, having beaten even world No.1 Jannik Sinner en route to that Halle title last month. He has the all-court game to thrive anywhere, as he has belatedly shown this year, plus ferocious power to go with the feel and trick shots in his armory.
Bublik hit 47 winners and made 39 unforced errors on Sunday, and afterwards praised his obdurate opponent, who off the back of reaching that final moves up 28 places to the aforementioned No.81 in the world.
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'Juan, I told you at the net, this was not tennis. This was complete torturing,' Bublik said in his on-court interview as Cerundolo smiled alongside him. 'This is my sixth title, and I have played the greatest of the game, but this final I will remember as one of the toughest that I ever played.'
Bublik is entered for the Generali Open in Kitzbühel, Austria, this week, before turning his attentions to the North American hard-court swing.
Charlie Eccleshare
The National Bank Open, better known as the Canadian Open, is still almost a week away, but it's already making some headlines for the wrong reasons — big names have been dropping out at a rate of knots.
Last week, Aryna Sabalenka said she was going to take a pass after multiple deep runs on the clay and the grass, including the French Open final and the semis at Wimbledon. She's tired, and has every right to be, having contested 56 matches since January — more than a lot of players clock up all year.
In recent days, Sinner, Novak Djokovic, Jack Draper and Carlos Alcaraz all said they'll skip Toronto and see everyone in Cincinnati in a couple of weeks. No surprise there from Djokovic, who ideally plays one lead-in tournament before a Grand Slam, if that, these days, as he tries to maintain his fitness before the grind of five-set tennis.
Sinner's withdrawal is a little more surprising. He won this tournament the last time it was played in Toronto two years ago (in 2024, it was in Montreal). The women's event is there this time, having been in Toronto 12 months earlier. But the Italian is just over a week removed from winning Wimbledon and playing in Canada would likely require some hard training this week, which he may not be ready for, physically or mentally.
Same goes for Alcaraz, who lost to Sinner in that Wimbledon final.
The Spaniard arrived at the U.S. Open with an empty tank last August, still disappointed from his loss to Djokovic in the gold medal match at the Olympics three weeks earlier. He then lost his temper as he was beaten in his first match in Cincinnati before going out in the second round in New York against Botic van de Zandschulp. The reasoning was simple — too much tennis.
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Draper, who lost in round two on home turf at Wimbledon, has withdrawn from Toronto and also Cincinnati because of an arm injury. He has said all season that maintaining his health throughout it is his top priority.
Add it all up, though, and some of the biggest players are sending a clear message: the tennis calendar in its current form, combined with the physicality of the modern game, is unsustainable.
Matt Futterman
🎾 ATP
🏆 Denis Shapovalov def. Aleksandar Kovacevic 6-4, 6-2 to win the Mifel Open (250) in Los Cabos, Mexico. It is the Canadian's fourth tour-level title.
🏆 Alexander Bublik def. Juan Manuel Cerundolo 6-4, 4-6, 6-2 to win the Swiss Open (250) in Gstaad, Switzerland. The 28-year-old was competing in his first final on clay.
🏆 Luciano Darderi def. Jesper de Jong 6-4, 3-6, 6-3 to win the Nordea Open (250) in Bastad, Sweden. The sixth seed clinched his third tour-level title.
🎾 WTA
🏆 Lois Boisson def. Anna Bondar 7-5, 6-3 to win the Hamburg Open (250) in Hamburg, Germany. It is the 2025 French Open semifinalist's first tour-level title.
🏆 Irina-Camelia Begu def. Jil Teichmann 6-0, 7-5 to win the Iasi Open (250) in Iasi, Romania. The seventh seed ended a three-year title drought on home soil.
📈 Irina-Camelia Begu is the highest climber of the week on the WTA tour, moving 28 places to No. 82 in the world after her triumph in Romania.
📈 Elena Rybakina ascends one place from No. 13 to No. 12 despite only reaching the last 32 at Wimbledon.
📈 Denis Shapovalov rises four places to No.30 after his win in Mexico.
📉 Alexandra Eala falls out of the top 60, dropping 13 places from No. 56 to No. 69.
📉 Pedro Martinez drops out of the top 50, falling 15 places from No. 47 to No. 62.
📉 Arthur Fils is out of the top 20, tumbling six spots to No. 21.
🎾 ATP
📍Washington, D.C.: Citi D.C. Open (500) featuring Taylor Fritz, Holger Rune, Daniil Medvedev and Ben Shelton.
📍Kitzbühel, Austria: Austrian Kitzbühel Open (250) featuring Alexander Bublik, Roberto Bautista Agut, Marton Fucsovics and Alexander Shevchenko.
📍Umag, Croatia: Croatia Open Umag (250) featuring Pierre-Hugues Herbert, Tseng Chun-hsin, Titouan Droguet and Stan Wawrinka.
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📺 UK: Sky Sports; U.S.: Tennis Channel 💻 Tennis TV
🎾 WTA
📍Washington, D.C.: Citi D.C. Open (500) featuring Venus Williams, Jessica Pegula, Elena Rybakina and Emma Raducanu.
📍Prague, Czech Republic: Prague Open (250) featuring Harriet Dart, Ann Li, Anastasia Gasanova and Alycia Parks.
📺 UK: Sky Sports; U.S.: Tennis Channel
Tell us what you noticed this week in the comments below as the men's and women's tours continue.