Aryna Sabalenka will return to Flushing Meadows as the reigning Queen of Queens, having lifting the women’s singles trophy last year. However, she’s hoping to do more than reclaim her crown—she wants to complete her trifecta of US Open titles by winning the reimagined Mixed Doubles Championship alongside Grigor Dimitrov.
While tennis fans are familiar with Sabalenka’s singles success, her two Grand Slam doubles titles at the 2019 US Open and 2021 Australian Open with partner Elise Mertens are relatively unheralded lines of her long resume. She’s been focusing on singles since the doubles win in Melbourne—and it's paid off, rising to world No. 1 and winning three major singles titles—but she’s getting back in the game for the chance to win $1 million while enjoying the camaraderie of doubles.
“I have a Grand Slam title in doubles and singles, and I always wanted to get it in mixed doubles but [it was] never a good time,” Sabalenka said. “Now they’re making it possible to be ready for the singles without playing both [draws] together.”
Dimitrov has spent less time on the doubles court than his partner, but has occasionally jumped in the draw, especially earlier in his career. His best result was a run to the Eastbourne final with Andreas Seppi in 2011, and he reached the third round of the Australian Open with Marcos Baghdatis in 2013. In mixed, Dimitrov and Aravan Rezai received a wild card for the 2011 French Open, but they fell to the No. 7 seeds.
However, Sabalenka and Dimitrov have teamed up before, playing mixed doubles together in the 2022 World Tennis League exhibition tournament in Dubai. They didn’t win their match against Bianca Andreescu and Rohan Bopanna, losing in the 10-point tiebreak, but the pair had enough fun that the Bulgarian was able to convince the former doubles No. 1 to play the US Open with him this summer.
Sabalenka originally didn't hear about the format change for 2025, including a smaller draw and shortened matches to be played during Fan Week, prior to the singles main draw—in part to attract top singles players like the returning champ. When Dimitrov started texting her and asking to play, she wasn't interested, wanting to focus on her title defense.
“I was like, ‘What are you talking about? Why would we play mixed doubles?’” Sabalenka said, according to tennis.com.
But Dimitrov was relentless.
“He was texting me, non-stop, begging me to play. I was like, ‘Man, I don’t want to play.’ But he was begging and I was like, ‘Okay, you got it.’”
How does Dimitrov visualize championship point, if the team reaches the final?
“I just hope that she’s just going to crush a serve and right away sets up to hit another big ball so I don’t really have to do much, so I can just fall down on my knees and just look up in the air and tell her how good she was,” he said.
Tickets for the mixed doubles action in Arthur Ashe Stadium are available via Ticketmaster and USOpen.org. Learn more about the event at the US Open Mixed Doubles Championship homepage—spectacular awaits!
