Everything you need to know about the Cincinnati Open as British men's No 1 Jack Draper features alongside Carlos Alcaraz and women's world No 1 Iga Swiatek; watch over 80 events a year, including the US Open, live on Sky Sports Tennis
Friday 16 August 2024 10:43, UK
Here's everything you need to know about the Cincinnati Open, including the draw, who's playing and the schedule. You can watch all the drama unfold live on Sky Sports Tennis.
British men's No 1 Jack Draper features in the evening session in Cincinnati on Friday after his superb second-round win over ninth seed Stefanos Tsitsipas.
From midnight UK time, he takes on the winner of the match between Norwegian seventh seed Casper Ruud and Canada's Felix Auger-Aliassime earlier in the day.
Women's world No 1 Iga Swiatek kicks off the day's action live on Sky Sports Tennis from taking on 15th seed Marta Kostyuk, with Carlos Alcaraz's postponed second-round clash with Gael Monfils to follow immediately after.
Staying with centre court, the next match scheduled from approximately 8pm sees men's world No 1 Jannik Sinner face Jordan Thompson of Australia.
Top contenders in the men's singles, Alexander Zverev (seeded 3rd) and Andrey Rublev (6th) are both in action from 4pm against Pablo Carreno Busta and Brandon Nakashima.
Meanwhile, in the women's tournament, there are a couple of mouth-watering matchups between third seed Aryna Sabalenka and Ukraine' Elina Svitolina, as well as 17-year-old Mirra Andreeva and Italian fifth seed Jasmine Paolini - both games due to start at roughly 8pm.
Emma Raducanu failed to receive a wild card for the tournament in Cincinnati, but British No 1s Katie Boulter and Draper were entered into the women's and men's singles respectively.
Draper is through tot the third round after following up a gruelling opening win over Spain's Munar with an impressive victory over ninth seed, and 2022 Cincinnati finalist, Tsitsipas.Boulter was beaten in the first round by Poland's Magda Linette.
Harriet Dart also suffered a first-round exit against Yulia Putintseva of Kazakhstan after the world No 77 had come through qualifying.
Cameron Norrie was due to participate in the men's draw but pulled out of a third consecutive tournament due to injury which casts his participation at the US Open in doubt. Norrie has not played since the Swedish Open in mid-July, withdrawing from the Paris Olympics and Canadian Open.
Raducanu, the US Open champion in 2021, reached the quarter-finals of the Mubadala Citi Open in Washington earlier this month before losing to eventual champion Paolo Badosa.
That is now likely to be the 21-year-old's last competitive action before heading to New York.
Alcaraz makes his return to hard courts following his Olympic silver medal at the Paris 2024 Olympics.
The reigning French Open and Wimbledon champion is seeded second and therefore enters the men's singles in the second round where he will face Monfils.
Alcaraz could potentially meet Draper in the quarter-finals, with the Brit having got the better of him 7-6 6-3 in their last meeting at Queen's Club earlier this summer.
Men's world No 1 Sinner and German third seed Zverev will look to challenge the Spaniard for the title, though they face a potential semi-final against each other.
In the women's draw, world No 1 Swiatek, Sabalenka, and Paolini are just some of the big names battling it out and hoping to reach a first final in Cincy.
The Cincinnati Open serves up as tune-up for the last Grand Slam of the year at Flushing Meadows, which begins on August 26 and is also live on Sky Sports.
Defending Cincinnati Open champion Novak Djokovic withdrew from the tournament following on from completing the golden slam with his Olympic gold medal at Paris 2024.
The record 24-time Grand Slam champion beat Alcaraz 7-6 7-6 in the men's singles final.
It was also the Spaniard who Djokovic beat to take the Cincinnati title last year, the Serbian emerging victorious 5-7 7-6 7-6 from an epic final which lasted for three hours and 49 minutes.
Djokovic is the defending champion of the US Open, having claimed his fourth title at Flushing Meadows and his most recent slam success there last year.
In the run-up to the final Grand Slam of 2024 - the US Open - you can watch all of the biggest tennis stars in action live on Sky Sports as they compete across the hard-court season.
Sky Sports+ has officially launched and will be integrated into Sky TV, streaming service NOW and the Sky Sports app - giving Sky Sports customers access to over 50 per cent more live sport this year at no extra cost.
