US Open star 'paralysed' after suffering biggest upset of the tournament

Madison Keys suffered the biggest upset of the US Open so far, as she lost a three-hour and 10-minute nailbiter to Renata Zarazua on Arthur Ashe Stadium. Keys came into her home Grand Slam tournament as the No. 6 seed and reigning Australian Open champion, having lifted her first Major title earlier this year.

A former finalist in Flushing Meadows, all signs were pointing to another deep run for Keys. But she suffered a 6-7(10) 7-6(3) 7-5 defeat to the world No. 82 and later confessed she had been "paralysed" by nerves.

"My warm-up was fine. I mean, I just feel like from pretty early on in the first set, it was pretty apparent that I wasn't playing great tennis today," the 2017 runner-up said.

"I feel like today I was just, for the first time in a while, where my nerves really got the better of me, and it kind of became a little bit paralysing.

"I felt like I was just slow, I wasn't seeing things the way that I wanted to, which I feel like resulted in a lot of bad decisions and lazy footwork. So I feel like that's kind of the summary."

It took years for Keys to finally get her hands on a long-awaited Grand Slam trophy. The American was just a teenager when top coaches predicted she would go on to become a Major champion.

Days before her 30th birthday, and more than seven years after she reached her first Grand Slam final at the US Open, Keys stunned Iga Swiatek and Aryna Sabalenka back-to-back to win the Australian Open.

It took all of the pressure off her shoulders. But Keys also admitted that she struggled coming into the US Open with the label of being a Grand Slam champion.

She added: "I think it was probably building a little bit. The reality is, it usually builds a little bit. You always kind of feel first-round jitters, and as the day is getting closer, feeling a little bit more and more nervous.

"But I feel like for whatever reason, today I just couldn't separate myself from the, I guess - and it's more than just saying, I want to win, but just feeling like winning matters just way too much, and I just couldn't quite separate myself from that. Then once you start playing badly, it just kind of all snowballs."

Keys' Grand Slam season has now come to an end for 2025. After the epic highs in Australia, she reached the quarter-finals of the French Open and then suffered a third-round defeat at Wimbledon before her shock early exit in New York.

"It's hard obviously. I've had a lot of success, have probably won the most matches I've ever won in a year, but then losing today," she said, trailing off.

"And I think it's more so, like, the way that I played today, it kind of sucks. But I think big picture, again, if you told me at the beginning of the year what I was signing up for, I would obviously say yes. So that's allegedly the beauty of the sport."

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