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Sports · US Open 2026 · Men's Singles · Round of 64
Valentin Vacherot vs Kamil Majchrzak — 6-4 4-6 7-6(3) 6-2
 Valentin Vacherot✓ | 6 | 4 | 7 | 6 |
 Kamil Majchrzak | 4 | 6 | 63 | 2 |
Final · Wednesday, September 2, 2026 · Round of 64
Result
Twelve double faults, seventeen aces, and six straight points when it mattered. Valentin Vacherot landed 40% of his first serves in the opening set and won 93% of the points behind them, which is this match in miniature — erratic, and unplayable when it landed. Kamil Majchrzak led the third-set tiebreak 3-1 before Vacherot took the next six points, and the fourth set was a different player: 74% first serves, 88% of those points won, one double fault and three unforced errors in the whole set. He served it out from 40-15 at 5-2, Majchrzak saved a match point, and a forehand ended it after 3hr 26min on Court 10. This is Vacherot's first US Open main draw, ten months after he came through qualifying at the Shanghai Masters ranked 204th in the world and won the title — the lowest-ranked Masters 1000 champion there has been, and the first from Monaco — beating Novak Djokovic on the way and his cousin Arthur Rinderknech in the final. He had lost four matches in a row before he got here. Majchrzak, 30 and ranked 73rd, has now played seven US Opens without going past the third round.
Valentin VacherotRows the source hadn’t published are left off rather than guessed.
At this Stage
The Round of 64 is where a Grand Slam draw stops being a lottery and becomes a tournament. Sixty-four men's matches opened the bracket; thirty-two across Wednesday and Thursday halve what is left, and everyone still here has already won on these courts. Seeds who came through the first round now meet opponents carrying form rather than a ranking.
Valentin Vacherot✓Kamil MajchrzakRound of 128
Round of 64
What we know now
What I said beforehand
The preview, frozen before the first serve. Clearly dated, never rewritten — that's the deal that makes the pick worth anything.
Vacherot, narrowly, and on the evidence of Monday rather than the season. The 22nd seed spent 1 hour 54 minutes beating Aleksandar Kovacevic 6-2 6-3 7-5 on Court 11 without conceding a single break point — fifteen holds, fourteen aces, 90% of his first-serve points won — which is the version of him that won Shanghai and not the version that had lost four in a row since July. Majchrzak was every bit as tidy on Sunday: 6-3 6-3 6-3 past Hamad Medjedovic in 1 hour 41 minutes on Court 12, thirteen aces, 84% behind the first serve, and fifteen unforced errors to Medjedovic's 38. The gap is real but small. Vacherot is No. 23 to Majchrzak's No. 73 and the ratings put it around 61–39, but the Pole's 66–60 career hard-court record is more than twice the volume of Vacherot's 29–17, and he reached the third round here a year ago. They have never played. Expect the serve to settle it and expect at least one set to go the distance.
The case for Valentin Vacherot
61% to winVacherot is the seed, the higher-ranked player and the one who has just produced the cleaner match: no break points faced across fifteen service games, 21 unforced errors to Kovacevic's 38, 96 points to 69. He is 6′4″ and serving at a level that made an entire match one-directional. Beating Kovacevic was also his first US Open win, which removes the one thing that could have been said about him here.
The case for Kamil Majchrzak
39% to winMajchrzak has done this before at this tournament — third round in 2025 — and his own opener was a 6-3 6-3 6-3 with thirteen aces and only fifteen unforced errors, which is at least as good a night's work. His career hard-court record, 66–60, dwarfs Vacherot's 29–17: the Monegasque's ranking is built on a very short, very steep run, and Majchrzak has spent seven more years learning how to win matches like this one. At No. 73 he is also the sort of opponent a first-time seed is expected to beat and often does not.
Both cases written 2026-08-31, before the first ball — frozen into the record exactly as written, whatever the result. The percentages are mine — opinions with a percent sign on. They add to 100 because tennis has no draw to hide the rounding in.
My locked pick: Valentin Vacherot to advance ✓ RIGHT
“The seed, fifty ranking places clear, and coming off an opener in which he never faced a break point.”
Locked 2026-08-31 17:45 UTC — rendered verbatim from the pick ledger; never a fresher, hedged version
Tale of the tape
Valentin VacherotKamil MajchrzakPlayer vitals: US Open official player feed (usopen.org) and Tennis Abstract career match logs · as of 2026-09-02.
Career head-to-head: Tennis Abstract career match logs (tour-level) · as of 2026-08-31.
Storylines
- Vacherot beat Kovacevic without facing a break point — fifteen holds, fourteen aces, 90% of first-serve points won — for his first US Open win.
- It was also his first win of any kind since July, after four straight defeats.
- Majchrzak reached the third round here in 2025 and opened this one 6-3 6-3 6-3 over Hamad Medjedovic in 1 hour 41 minutes.
- First meeting: the two have never played at tour level.
- Career hard-court records: Majchrzak 66–60, Vacherot 29–17 — the seed has played less than half as much tennis on the surface.
Head to head
They have never met at tour level.
Source: Tennis Abstract career match logs (tour-level) · as of 2026-08-31.
Court & schedule: Court 10, Wednesday 2 September. The US Open posts each day's order of play the evening before; this one is on the board. (Official US Open order of play, as of 2026-09-02)
Weather: Sunday — the men's final, and the last match of the fortnight — is 78°F with showers and thunderstorms 95% likely, the wettest day of the two weeks and the one day that cannot be pushed back. Ashe closes its roof and plays on. It clears overnight: 20% Sunday night, 20% Monday, then dry and sunny from Tuesday. (National Weather Service New York forecast, as of 2026-09-13)
Venue: USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, Flushing Meadows, New York — hard.