Madison Keys has joked about how she unintentionally went against her fiance's advice in her
US Open quarter-final match due to the noise of the crowd.
Seventeenth seed Keys has had a dream run so far at the last Grand Slam of the year in New York. The American player ousted Arantxa Rus, Yanina Wickmayer, and fourteenth seed Liudmila Samsonova before dominating her Round of 16 match against World No. 3 Jessica Pegula.
Keys defeated her compatriot in straight sets 6-1, 6-3 to set up a quarter-final clash with reigning Wimbledon champion and ninth seed
Marketa Vondrousova. The Czech player had been progressing well through the tournament, but sustained an arm injury in her fourth-round match.
Keys went on to fly past her in straight sets to reach her first semi-final at Flushing Meadows since 2018, winning the match 6-1, 6-4.
Advice for Keys lost in noise
The 2017 US Open runner-up received immense support from a very vocal home crowd. In fact, the noise levels were so high that Keys revealed afterwards that she hadn't even been able to hear her team during the match.
"To be honest I couldn’t hear sh*t out here tonight, sorry," she said while laughing during her on-court interview.
In particular, the 28-year-old said the advice that her fiance, fellow tennis player Bjorn Fratangelo, had tried to offer her during the match had been completely lost in the noise.
"But yeah couldn’t hear anything you [pointing at Fratangelo] were saying something and I was like ‘Yeah sure, I got it'," she continued, before disclosing that at times, she ended up doing the opposite of what her fiance was advising her to do.
"I didn’t hear anything what he was saying. He was apparently telling me to go at her forehand and I was playing her backhand so there we go," she joked.
Keys will go on to face second seed Aryna Sabalenka in the semi-finals of the US Open.