Jessica Pegula revealed her support for the new format of the US Open Mixed Doubles event after sailing past Daniil Medvedev and Mirra Andreeva in the quarterfinal of the tournament on Wednesday, August 20. The American paired up with Jack Draper for the newly introduced exhibition event and knocked out Carlos Alcaraz and Emma Raducanu in their first match.
Pegula is a well-established doubles player in the WTA circuit with seven titles in her career so far. Her most prominent doubles partnership has been alongside Coco Gauff, with the pair winning three WTA 1000 titles (2022 Qatar Open, 2022 Canadian Open, 2023 Miami Open) and also qualifying for the final of the French Open in 2022.
The new format separates the mixed doubles as a separate and shorter exhibition event, with the involvement of star players like Carlos Alcaraz, Novak Djokovic, and Iga Swiatek. This is done to attract more viewers and better publicity for the tournament altogether, which didn’t sit well with many tennis stars.
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During the press conference after the quarterfinal match at Flushing Meadows in New York, the 31-year-old claimed that she is enjoying her time at the event, irrespective of the backlash the new format has received so far.
"Yeah, one of the reasons I always played a lot of doubles, played doubles and singles, is because I really enjoyed it on the off days. I know it's maybe different foemen playing three-out-of-five at a slam. I always enjoyed it. I'd rather compete and work on things in doubles. It's pretty similar with working on serve, return, first ball, stuff like that," she said.
Replying to the interviewer, Jessica Pegula expressed hopes for major tournaments to explore this format further. She supported the possibility and said:
"I always enjoyed that rather than sitting around and hitting the ball for 45 minutes, nitpicking what's wrong with me today (smiling). I'd rather play. Yeah, I'm all for it. I think it's been a really fun experience so far."
The top-seeded pair will face Iga Swiatek and Casper Ruud in the semifinal later on Wednesday.
Jessica Pegula compliments doubles partner Jack Draper
In the same press conference, Jessica Pegula revealed her change in partnership experience has been 'great' at the US Open event. She was supposed to be paired with Tommy Paul initially, but split up right before the event commenced due to undisclosed reasons.
However, Pegula claimed that her partnership with Jack Draper is going better than she expected.
"I feel like you're a way better doubles player than I thought. I don't know how much you played doubles. But he's, like, calling things, wants to be super aggressive in formations and stuff like that. That was great. I feel like, yeah, I wasn't expecting that," said Jessica Pegula.
The American was critical of the tournament organizers initially for changing the format without communicating with the players.
