US Open 2026 pages
Sports · US Open 2026 · Women's Singles · Round of 128
Arantxa Rus vs 
Leolia Jeanjean
Sunday, August 30, 2026 · Round of 128
Watch: ESPN · ESPN2 · ABC · ESPN app
My pick: Leolia Jeanjean to advance · locked 2026-08-29 01:40 UTCPrediction
Rus is 35, left-handed, ranked 203rd and through qualifying; Jeanjean is 31, on a wild card at 127th, and 12–12 this season against Rus's 2–4. The career records tell the older story — Rus has 226 hard-court matches on her ledger and a losing record in them (95–131), Jeanjean 57 and 26–31. Current form and the wild card point to Jeanjean; the left-handed awkwardness and three qualifying wins keep Rus close. Jeanjean in three.
The case for Arantxa Rus
36% to winRus is left-handed, which at this level is still worth a game a set, and she has three wins on these courts this week where Jeanjean has none. She has also been to a US Open second round; Jeanjean lost in the first round in her only previous appearance.
The case for Leolia Jeanjean
64% to winJeanjean is 12–12 this season against 2–4, 76 ranking places higher, and four years younger. Rus's career hard-court record is 95–131 — a losing one — and hard courts have never been where she does her best work.
Both cases written 2026-08-29, 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.
Tale of the tape
Arantxa RusLeolia JeanjeanPlayer vitals: US Open official player feed (usopen.org) and Tennis Abstract career match logs · as of 2026-08-28.
Career head-to-head: Tennis Abstract career match logs (tour-level) · as of 2026-08-28.
The briefing
Storylines
- Rus, 35, is the oldest woman in the singles draw and got in through qualifying.
- Jeanjean, 31, is here on a wild card after losing in the first round in her only previous US Open.
- Rus's career hard-court record is 95–131; this is not her surface.
Head to head
They have never met.
Source: Tennis Abstract career match logs (tour-level) · as of 2026-08-28.
Watch: Opening-round coverage runs across ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC, with ESPN Deportes in Spanish — and every court streams in the ESPN app, including the whip-around channel that only exists in the early rounds. (ESPN press-room release and listings, as of 2026-08-27)
Court & schedule: Not yet assigned. Days one and two of the main draw are on the board; this match falls in the back half of the first round, and the US Open posts each day's order of play the evening before. (Official US Open order-of-play release cadence, as of 2026-08-28)
Weather: The forecast cooled since the draw: Sunday opens partly sunny near 80°F with a slight shower chance after 2 p.m., and a 40% chance of showers and thunderstorms arrives with Sunday night. Monday is similar at 81°F, and the storm odds climb through Tuesday and Wednesday. Ashe and Armstrong close their roofs; the field courts wait. (National Weather Service New York forecast, as of 2026-08-28)
Venue: USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, Flushing Meadows, New York — hard.
At this Stage
The Round of 128 is the widest the net ever gets: 64 matches a draw, spread across three days, every seed in action and every qualifier playing the biggest match of the year. This half of the bracket filled in late — qualifying ran a day long after rain pushed the last round to Friday, so these names were still blank slots on draw night. First-round losers leave with $140,000. The winner draws Potapova or Valentová in the Round of 64.
