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Sports · US Open 2026 · Women's Singles · Round of 64
Madison Keys vs Anna Bondar — 5-7 6-4 7-6(5)
 Madison Keys✓ | 5 | 6 | 7 |
 Anna Bondar | 7 | 4 | 65 |
Final · Thursday, September 3, 2026 · Round of 64
Result
Anna Bondar served for the match at 5-2 in the third set and double-faulted on match point; she double-faulted on the next one too, and Madison Keys broke back. Three more match points came and went on Keys' serve at 3-5 — one of them saved with an ace — and Bondar never had another. Keys held to love for 6-5, and in the deciding tiebreak, which the majors play to ten points, the first five points all went against serve; Keys trailed 3-5 and then won the last seven. Two hours and fifty-eight minutes. The numbers read like a different match: Keys hit 51 winners to 17 and came in 31 times, and still won only 125 points to 117, with both women breaking four times and serving eight double faults. Bondar is 29, ranked 73, and had a first Grand Slam third round in front of her — she has never been past the second round of a major. Keys, the 2025 Australian Open champion and a finalist here in 2017, lost in the first round in New York last year and has reached the fourth round at each of this year's other three Slams.
Madison KeysRows the source hadn’t published are left off rather than guessed.
At this Stage
The Round of 64 halves the draw again: 32 women's matches across Wednesday and Thursday, every one of them between players who have already won here this week. The seeds who came through the opening round now meet opponents with form behind them rather than a ranking.
Round of 128
Round of 64
What we know now
Court: Stadium 17
Match length: 2:58
Watch: ESPN · ESPN2 · ABC · ESPN app
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.
Keys, and the case against her is that she has already been made to work once this week. Ten of the twenty-two games in her first round went against serve; she failed to serve out a set from 5-3, was broken back from 0-40, and made thirty unforced errors against a 19-year-old ranked 69th. Bondar had a cleaner afternoon on Court 6 and, more to the point, has done exactly this before: she beat the 12th seed Elina Svitolina in the first round here a year ago. But she is 56-79 on hard courts for her career, and Keys is 239-152. Their one meeting, in the Charleston fourth round in March, went 6-2 7-5 to Keys on clay, the surface that most favours Bondar's patience. On a hard court, in a stadium, against the biggest ball-striker either of them will face this fortnight, patience runs out.
The case for Madison Keys
79% to winKeys is a former Australian Open champion, the 2017 runner-up on these courts, and 239-152 on hard courts across her career against Bondar's 56-79. She won their only meeting on Bondar's better surface. She also came through the round that has ambushed her before — she lost in the first round here last year — and the twenty-one winners she hit on Tuesday were three times her opponent's.
The case for Anna Bondar
21% to winBondar has already beaten a top-15 seed in this round at this tournament: Elina Svitolina, 6-2 6-4, twelve months ago. She reached a final in Hamburg this year and is 25-24 on the season, and she has the game to make Keys hit one more ball than Keys wants to. Tuesday's evidence cuts her way too — Keys was broken four times by a teenager and needed three set points and a second match point to finish. A shaky serving day from Keys is not a rare event, and it is the whole margin here.
Both cases written 2026-09-01, 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: Madison Keys to advance ✓ RIGHT
“The hard-court records are not close and the only meeting went Keys's way on Bondar's surface — but Bondar has beaten a seed in this round before.”
Locked 2026-09-01 22:35 UTC — rendered verbatim from the pick ledger; never a fresher, hedged version
Tale of the tape
Madison KeysAnna BondarPlayer 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 2026-09-01.
Storylines
- One previous meeting: Keys won 6-2 7-5 in the Charleston fourth round on clay in March 2026.
- Bondar beat the 12th seed Elina Svitolina 6-2 6-4 in the first round here in 2025.
- Keys came through ten breaks of serve in twenty-two games against Alina Korneeva, failing to serve out both sets from 5-3.
- Keys lost in the first round of this tournament last year, to Renata Zarazua.
- Bondar reached the Hamburg final this season and is ranked No. 73; her best US Open run is the second round.
Head to head
One meeting, in the Charleston round of 16 on clay in March 2026: Keys won 6-2 7-5. They have never met on a hard court.
Source: Tennis Abstract career match logs (tour-level) · as of 2026-09-01.
Court & schedule: Stadium 17, Thursday 3 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.