- Serena Williams and Carlos Alcaraz face qualifiers Erin Routliffe and Lloyd Glasspool in Tuesday’s US Open mixed doubles first round.
- Routliffe is the reigning US Open women’s doubles champion, and both qualifiers are former doubles world No. 1s.
- Williams is playing her first US Open since 2022, and Alcaraz his first tournament since April because of a wrist injury.
- The 16-team event runs Tuesday and Wednesday, with $1 million to the winning pair.
NEW YORK – The US Open mixed doubles draw sends its two biggest names, Serena Williams and Carlos Alcaraz, straight into Tuesday’s opener at Arthur Ashe Stadium against Erin Routliffe and Lloyd Glasspool, the one first-round pairing built to beat them.
The Specialists’ Case
The US Open granted Williams and Alcaraz a wild card into the 16-team field, and the pairing is the event’s box office. The tennis case runs the other way. Routliffe won the US Open women’s doubles title in 2023 and again last year, and she and Glasspool have each held the doubles world No. 1 ranking.
The qualifiers also arrive match-sharp. Monday’s qualifying gave them two wins in one day – 4-1, 3-5 [10-7] over Luisa Stefani and Neal Skupski, then 5-4(4), 2-4 [11-9] against Kristina Mladenovic and Marcelo Arevalo. Both wins came down to match tiebreakers, which means the pair has already played the exact pressure points this format turns on. Last year’s revamped event made the same argument when doubles specialists Sara Errani and Andrea Vavassori took the title over a field of singles stars.
Rust on Both Sides of the Star Team
Williams, 44, last appeared at the US Open in 2022, and this is only her fifth tournament since her June comeback – she is skipping the singles draw entirely. Alcaraz, sidelined since Barcelona in April by the wrist injury that cost him the French Open and Wimbledon, is playing his first competitive tennis in four months.
The two have never played a match together, and the format gives them no runway to find chemistry. Short sets, no-ad scoring and match tiebreakers reward pairs who already know each other’s patterns, because a single unfamiliar poach call at deuce decides a game outright.
For bettors, that is the whole shape of the matchup: the ring-rust and the partnership questions sit entirely on one side of the net, and the sharp, decorated, just-qualified team sits on the other. Legal tennis betting markets in regulated states will price exactly that gap once the board opens.
Format and the Board
First-round and quarterfinal matches run Tuesday, with the semifinals and final Wednesday and $1 million to the winning team, all before the main singles draws begin. Bovada had not posted match prices for the opening round as of Tuesday morning; when the board opens, the qualifiers’ resume – not the marquee names – is where the number starts. Legal US Open betting covers the tournament’s markets state by state, alongside the full legal sports betting menu.
The winner of Tuesday’s opener plays a quarterfinal the same day, with a possible Aryna Sabalenka-Novak Djokovic pairing waiting deeper in the draw.
