2018 US Open Quarter-final

Two years before Thiem would emerge from the US Open with his first major title, he demonstrated his affinity for the hard courts of the year’s last Slam. Facing Rafael Nadal, a (then) three-time winner in Flushing and the top seed in the quarters, Thiem played one of the most dominant sets I have ever witnessed. A redlining Thiem trounced Nadal in the opening set, producing a bewildering 6-0 bagel. Nadal didn’t lose many sets 6-0 in his pro career, and the shocked fans in attendance knew that kind of blitzing couldn’t possibly continue. Sure enough: A five-set marathon thriller ensued, producing swashbuckling tennis that lasted four hours and 49 minutes, until 2:14 a.m.

After two sets, I moved down courtside: the fourth row in Arthur Ashe Stadium, right on the baseline. Fans gasped as the Austrian belted seven, eight, nine ferocious topspin forehands in a row, each one a blast more sonic than the last, each one impossibly returned by Nadal. Deep in the fifth set, Nadal squandered a 0/40 advantage on Thiem’s serve. Three chances to break, three opportunities miraculously saved by the valiant Austrian.

Nearly five hours in, the match went to an inevitable fifth-set tie-break. The wee-hours atmosphere, with a crowd still 8,000-strong, was electric. At match point, 5/6 in the tie-break, Thiem kicked a hard serve wide that pulled Nadal off court. The Mallorcan got his racquet on it, producing a forehand that landed short in the court. Thiem smacked a wicked topspin forehand deep into the opposite corner. Nadal raced to his right and lunged, sliding on the hard court. His racquet just inches from the ground, Nadal lofted a one-handed backhand skyward. Thiem retreated deep, but his final overhead floated beyond the baseline. Nadal embraced Thiem on the other side of the net.

About that match, unjustly a quarter-final, Thiem said, "It's going to be stuck in my mind forever. It's cruel sometimes, tennis, because I think this match didn't really deserve a loser. But there has to be one." 

2020 US Open Final

Thiem’s greatest moment of glory, his 2020 US Open championship triumph, was less than glorious as a tennis match. On paper it looks to have been an all-time thriller: a 7-6 win in the fifth set, with the Austrian storming back to win after being down two sets to love. In reality, it was an eerie, extremely tense, error-filled match played to an entirely empty stadium. The final took place at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, and the whole tournament was conducted with no fans on site.

Even on television, it was a surreal match to watch. Neither player could summon anything close to his best tennis, producing sloppy errors and enervated serves. After Thiem dug himself out from a two-set deficit, Zverev served for the championship at 5-3; it appeared that the big-serving German, not Thiem, would claim his first major title. Thiem broke to stay alive and get to a final-set tie-break.

That US Open championship represented Thiem’s long-awaited breakthrough in a major. He became, finally, the first of the ballyhooed “next-generation” stars to claim a Slam, and the title was expected to serve as a launching pad for the Austrian. “The future of men’s tennis, on all surfaces!” exclaimed the announcer Luke Jensen as Thiem lifted the trophy above his head, to deafening silence.

Instead, Thiem’s career apex quickly devolved into a downward spiral from which Thiem never fully recovered, no matter how hard he applied himself. In retrospect, Thiem understands what the US Open represented. “Still,” he said earlier this year, “I mean, 2020 is above everything else in my tennis career.”

 “The 2020 final was fitting very well with the circumstances,” he said in an ATP interview this year. “It was definitely the weirdest Grand Slam tournament I played, in front of nobody – an empty Arthur Ashe Stadium. I think we both really felt the nerves of seeing the finish line.”

“Of course, I would have wished that it would be on a on a full Arthur Ashe Stadium with all the energy. But on the other hand, probably or hopefully there will never be a tournament like this again,” Thiem rationalised. “It was also a very unique one that I won.”

“I think it's a little bit of a mirror of my career. So it fits perfectly.”

2019 Roland Garros Semi-final

Over the course of two horrendously windy and rainy days, with multiple, frustrating rain delays, Thiem defeated No. 1 Djokovic – who had won the previous three majors, dating to the 2018 US Open – in a drama-filled contest that catapulted the fourth-seeded Thiem to his second straight Roland Garros final. On day two, the Serb saved two match points when Thiem served for the match at 5-3 in the final set and then knotted the score at 5-all. Thiem held for 6-5 and broke serve to win the match, rocketing a flamboyant forehand winner down the line on match point. Thiem blasted 52 winners to thwart Djokovic’s streak of 26 straight wins at majors.

The match was a mark of personal and national pride: Thiem became the first Austrian to make the final of multiple majors.

“Playing in hurricane kind of conditions, it’s hard to perform your best,” Djokovic told reporters after the match. “I’m feeling fine,” said Thiem after the semi-final. “I’m full of adrenaline, of course, still from today’s match and also I will have that tomorrow. I’m ready to leave all or everything that I have left out on the court tomorrow.” (Against Nadal in the final, Thiem’s leaving everything on the court would not be enough; Thiem lost his second-straight Roland Garros final to the Spaniard.)