By Randy Walker
@TennisPublisher
A player from the Netherlands pulled a shocking second round upset at the U.S. Open.
This was true at the 2024 U.S. Open – as well as 35 years earlier almost exactly to the day at the 1989 U.S. Open.
Of course, reigning Wimbledon and French Open champion Carlos Alcaraz was shockingly upset in straight sets to Botic van de Zandschulp of the Netherlands, but, ironically 35 years earlier, minus one day, another aspiring Dutch player registered a seismic U.S. Open upset.
On August 31, 1989, Paul Haarhuis, a qualifier ranked No. 114 in the world, wearing old, scuffed and dirty shoes, upset four-time U.S. Open champion and No. 4 seeded John McEnroe 6-4, 4-6, 6-3, 7-5 in the second round.
“It’s one thing if the guy plays really well,” said McEnroe after the match, two years after returning to tennis after an eight-month break from tennis. “It’s harder to take if I play as poorly as I did. This is a tough one to take. I worked to get to No. 4 in the world, then to lose to a guy I hadn’t seen play before is pretty bad. I expected more from myself.”
Said Haarhuis after his upset, “I was loose. There was no pressure on me to win. All I had to do was go out and play good tennis. And it’s a great feeling to beat a great player like John McEnroe.”
Haarhuis and McEnroe were both in the stadium court of the U.S. Open exactly 35 years later minus one day on August 30, 2024, albeit in the 23,000 seat Arthur Ashe Stadium rather than the then 20,000 seat Louis Armstrong Stadium, which was then the main court at the U.S. Open.
Haarhuis was in the player box for van de Zandshulp during his upset over the No. 3 seeded Alcaraz as the Davis Cup captain for the Netherlands. McEnroe called the match for ESPN in the TV booth above the court. He spoke of his loss to Haarhuis during the broadcast saying “He’s the only guy I lost to who I had never heard of.”
While Haarhuis was a qualifier ranked No. 114, van de Zandshulp was ranked No. 74 and had a bit more pedigree, having reached the quarterfinals of the U.S. Open (as a qualifier coincidentally) in 2021 and reached a career-high ranking of No. 22.
“I don’t know what to say right now,” said Alcaraz after the match. “I mean, first of all, I think he played great. He played really good tennis. I thought he was going to give me more points. I’m going to say more free points, you know. He didn’t make a lot of mistakes that I thought he was going to do. So I was, you know, confusing a little bit. I didn’t know how to manage that, how to deal with it. I couldn’t increase my level. I think my level stayed at the same point all the match, and it wasn’t enough to win the match or to give myself the chance to getting into the match or trying to give myself chances. So, you know, what can I say? I didn’t feel well hitting the ball. I think I made a lot of mistakes. When I wanted to come back or I think I wanted to come back, it was too late.”
