“I spent the entirety of the off-season rehabbing”: Taylor Fritz injury clouds USA’s United Cup title defence

World No. 6 Taylor Fritz has reportedly picked up an injury that will rule him out of his next United Cup match. The American No. 1 is coming off a surprising opening-round loss to Sebastian Baez and was later seen speaking with the tournament director, apparently to inform him that he would withdraw from his upcoming encounter.

The 2024 US Open runner-up is dealing with what he described as “pretty serious tendonitis”, an issue expected to sideline him for the remainder of the tournament. Fritz is set to be replaced by Mackenzie McDonald (World No. 114), who travelled with Team USA as the No. 2 ATP singles player and is ready to step in if needed.

It was a difficult day for the Americans, who were left stunned by Fritz’s defeat. The match had been considered a formality for the home favourite against clay-court specialist Baez. Fritz had won all five of their previous meetings and had not dropped more than four games in any of the 10 sets they had played against each other.

The American started exactly as expected, taking the opening set and building a 6-4, 2-0 lead. However, momentum began to shift as Baez found his way back into the contest. The South American recovered the break in the third game of the second set and went on to complete an impressive comeback, sealing a 4-6, 7-5, 6-4 victory — the second Top 10 win of his career.

Despite the scare, Team USA managed to bounce back in the remaining matches. Coco Gauff’s dominant 6-1, 6-1 win over Solana Sierra revived American hopes, and they encountered no issues in the mixed doubles, where Gauff teamed up with Christian Harrison to defeat María Lourdes Carlé and Guido Andreozzi. A loss in either of those matches would have resulted in immediate elimination, handing qualification to Argentina.

Fritz’s injury not only complicates the United States’ ambitions at the United Cup — where they are the defending champions and the only team featuring two Top 10 players — but also raises concerns ahead of the Australian Open. The United Cup was Fritz’s only scheduled warm-up event for the season’s first Grand Slam, leaving him with little time to recover fully with the Happy Slam just two weeks away.

“I spent the majority — pretty much the entirety — of the off-season trying to rehab my knee tendinopathy,” Fritz said during his post-match press conference. “But that’s something that takes months and months to get better. I didn’t get to play a lot of points because I’m trying not to push it too hard.”

The 28-year-old added that it is an issue he has been dealing with for some time and admitted that, if a full recovery does not come in the coming months, he may consider taking an extended break from competition.

“It’s just going to be a struggle trying to get the reps in and get the points and matches in to start feeling comfortable while juggling that with managing my knee pain,” he added. “I’m going to try to play through it and keep doing the rehab while travelling. But if that doesn’t work in a couple of months, then I’m going to have to full stop and fix it.”