Photo: Darren Carroll / USTA / Courtesy
QUEENS, NY.- A Mexican and a Salvadoran also made history this weekend by playing the mixed doubles final at the US Open. They did not manage to be champions, but their mere presence in reaching this stage in a Grand Slam is also a glory that must be counted.
Is about Giuliana Olmos and Marcelo Arevalo, they fell in two sets of 5-7 and 2-6 against the duo made up of the American Desirae Krawczyk and the british Joe Salisbury.
The Latin American couple was defeated by players of great trajectory. Krawczyk’s triumph made him the seventh player to win three of four Grand Slam mixed doubles titles in the same year. She won Roland Garros with Salisbury and Wimbledon with another Briton, Neal skupski. For Salisbury, who won the men’s doubles title with the American Rajeev ram, became the first man to win the men’s and mixed doubles titles at the US Open since Bob bryan in 2010.
Of the game that was played in the stadium Arthur Ashe little was said amid the attention the women’s and men’s singles finals won the British Emma raducanu and the russian Daniil Medvedev.
Latin tennis stands out
However, Latin tennis, with players who speak Spanish, had a marked presence in the New York tournament of Flushing Meadows. Thus, the Spanish Daniel Rincon, 18 years old, was the junior champion and the Aztec player along with the Salvadoran, vice-champions in mixed doubles of the last Grand Slam of the season.
Olmos, 28 years old, and Arévalo, 30, won the pass to the final after starring in a spectacular comeback against the couple made up of the Ukrainian Dayana Yastremska and the australian Max purcell, with partials of 4-6, 6-4 and 10-6.
Despite the fact that they have only been playing together for a short time, Olmos and Arévalo have got on very well, as confirmed by the statistics established by the tournament. It was the pair that made the fewest errors and an effectiveness of 65 percent in the first serves, in short, they reached the final showing a brilliant and consistent tennis in the decisive moments.
For the Mexican, the final in New York was the first of the season. At Roland Garros he could not contest the semifinal, due to an injury suffered by his partner, the Colombian Juan Sebastian Cabal.
Meanwhile Arévalo, this 2021 reached to be a quarterfinalist in the Australian Open, did the third round in the French Open and in 2019 he had reached the third round of the US Open.
Arévalo’s participation marked a historic milestone for El Salvador, since it was the first time that a tennis player from a Central American country played the final of a Grand Slam.
“This has been a very, very special moment for me. I never thought that I would see a Salvadoran flag in the best stadium in the world to play tennis, so it is a very happy moment for me, ”said Arevalo during the award ceremony while holding back tears.
The way Olmos and Arévalo met and got together to play the US Open is also an anecdotal point for the Latin American couple. Both exchanged messages through social networks commenting on the possibility of making the pair and coming to the Big Apple and, in a matter of a couple of days, they were already playing, the result, they reached the grand final of the New York tournament