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Sports · US Open 2026 · Women's Singles · Round of 32
Karolina Muchova vs Emma Navarro — 6-3 7-5
 Emma Navarro✓ | 6 | 7 |
 Karolina Muchova | 3 | 5 |
Final · Friday, September 4, 2026 · Round of 32
Result
Muchová had dropped four games in two matches coming into this. She lost serve first, recovered to 3-3, and then lost twelve points in a row; Navarro closed the set with a love hold, by which point twenty-two of the Czech's eventual thirty-two unforced errors were already down. They traded breaks twice in the second before the eleventh game, where Muchová saved two break points and then hit long on the third, and Navarro served it out on her second match point with a forehand. It is her third win over a top-ten player this year and it came on the Grandstand, where she has now played her last six matches in New York. "I knew it was going to be tough today," she said. "Conditions were definitely harder today, it was very windy," Muchová said, "but they were the same for both of us and I dealt with it worse." She was playing her first singles tournament since losing the Wimbledon final and having a minor operation after it, and put the defeat down to her own errors and too many thoughts in her head.
Karolina MuchovaRows the source hadn’t published are left off rather than guessed.
At this Stage
The Round of 32 is the third round, and the last one before a Grand Slam draw becomes a small tournament: sixteen women's matches across Friday and Saturday leave sixteen players standing, every one of them having won twice on these courts. This is the round where the seeding chart stops doing any work — from here on, whoever is left is who you play.
Round of 64
Round of 32
What we know now
Court: Grandstand
Match length: 1:47
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.
Both women reached the semi-finals of this tournament in 2024 and neither has played the other, anywhere, ever. Muchova is having the best season of her career — 36-10, ranked seventh, a Wimbledon finalist in July and, ten days ago inside this tournament, the mixed doubles champion with Jakub Mensik. She has spent 58 minutes on court in her second round: 6-1 6-0 over Katie Boulter under the Armstrong roof, eleven consecutive games from 1-1, seven break points converted from seven. Navarro has had to work much harder. She is 21-18 for the season and needed 2 hours 46 minutes to get past Caty McNally in an all-American second round, losing the first set and 39 unforced errors along the way. She is a semi-finalist here and a genuinely awkward opponent — she absorbs pace as well as anyone in the draw — but Muchova's variety is the exact answer to that, and the Elo tables put her 160 points clear. The one number that argues for Navarro is 2 hours 46 minutes: she has been tested this week and Muchova has not.
The case for Karolina Muchova
74% to winMuchova is 36-10 in the best season of her life, a Wimbledon finalist and already a champion at this tournament in the mixed doubles. She lost one game in her second round and won eleven in a row to end it. Her hard-court record is 145-66 to Navarro's 68-55, she is 20 places higher, and she has the widest range of shots left in this half of the draw — which against a counterpuncher is the whole match.
The case for Emma Navarro
26% to winNavarro reached the semi-finals here in 2024 and knows how to win ugly on these courts; she has just come from a set down against an opponent who beat her in June. She takes the ball early and gives nothing away in a rally, which blunts a drop-shot game more than a power game does. Muchova has played 58 minutes in her last match and has not been made to run once this week — untested is not the same as sharp.
Both cases written 2026-09-02, 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: Karolina Muchova to advance ✗ WRONG
“The best season of her career, 160 Elo points, and a variety game that is the standard answer to a counterpuncher; Navarro's semi-final here is the reason it is not higher.”
Locked 2026-09-02 23:55 UTC — rendered verbatim from the pick ledger; never a fresher, hedged version
Tale of the tape
Karolina MuchovaEmma NavarroPlayer vitals: US Open official player feed (usopen.org) and Tennis Abstract career match logs · as of 2026-09-04.
Career head-to-head: Tennis Abstract career match logs (tour-level) · as of 2026-09-02.
Storylines
- Both women reached the US Open semi-finals in 2024; they have never played each other.
- Muchova beat Katie Boulter 6-1 6-0 in 58 minutes, winning eleven consecutive games and all seven break points she made.
- Muchova won this tournament's mixed doubles title with Jakub Mensik and was the Wimbledon runner-up in July.
- Navarro needed 2 hours 46 minutes and three sets to beat Caty McNally, having lost to her at 's-Hertogenbosch in June.
- Muchova is 36-10 for the season, Navarro 21-18.
Head to head
They have never met.
Source: Tennis Abstract career match logs (tour-level) · as of 2026-09-02.
Court & schedule: Grandstand, Friday 4 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 2026-09-03)
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.