When Karen Khachanov was a kid, he did more than train to become a professional tennis player. The Moscow-native swam, played basketball and participated in athletics.

But from ages 10-11, he also attended chess class. Instead of blasting forehands and crushing backhands, Khachanov learned to outmanoeuvre opponents on a 64-square board, where no physical power or foot speed could help him.

“[In chess] you need to think all the time. You have 100 different combinations and variations with each move. It always depends which figure your opponent will move. There always has to be some tactics and for sure it’s a mental game as well,” Khachanov said. “You need to stay sometimes three, four hours in a competition if we’re talking about professional chess to sweat it out and try to think about one move [for] maybe 30 minutes.

“You break your head and that’s the really interesting part of the chess game.”

Some see Khachanov’s power from the baseline and miss the tactics he uses to position himself for his biggest shots. In a way, he believes all the thinking that goes into the sport makes it similar to chess.

“I think there are some similarities because you always think about what type of shot you can do, tactics are one of the most important things in tennis as well,” Khachanov said. “[It is about] where you place a shot, how hard, how high, percentage of the serves, where you’re going to stay, where you’re going to return and all those things. Of course they matter. It’s not that simple I would say, but there are some similarities.”

Khachanov does not constantly follow professional chess tournaments, but he is plenty familiar with the biggest stars in the chess world like Magnus Carlsen and Hikaru Nakamura. He also watched The Queen’s Gambit, which he called “one of the nicest TV shows I remember on Netflix”.

One of his coaches, Jose Manuel ‘Pepo’ Clavet, is also a chess fan. When they are together, they play two or three games per day.

“I think [I play chess] the same way I am in tennis,” Khachanov said, cracking a laugh. “I try to be the same way.”

Khachanov is also a basketball fan, who attends NBA games when he can, like he did earlier this year during the Miami Open presented by Itau. The 26-year-old was a big fan of the Miami Heat when he was younger, watching LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh lead the team to glory. He is a big fan of James, which has led him to follow the Los Angeles Lakers more closely, although he is still a Heat fan.

“I think the way he is, the mentality that he has in the sport, what he [has] achieved already. He’s one of the best athletes. Let’s say [he is like] Cristiano in soccer, Messi in soccer, him, Jordan… like Rafa, Novak and Roger in tennis,” Khachanov said. “He’s one of the best basketball players. I think the way he stays motivated and is still looking forward to play at his best and is still scoring the way that he does, it’s tough to explain sometimes.”

On the court, Khachanov has been one of the most consistent players on the circuit in recent years. Since August 2018, he has been lodged in the Top 35 of the Pepperstone ATP Rankings without falling from that group.

“Sometimes you just look forward to being better. Sometimes you can be worse as well, so in a way I never look back and think I’m Top 20, Top 30, Top 35. I always look forward to achieving my goals and try to move forward,” Khachanov said. “I always think of how I can improve to rise up in the rankings, to be back in the Top 10. This is the ultimate goal I have. I’m working every day to try to find out what I need [to do], what I can do better.”

Khachanov reached his career-high of World No. 8 in July 2019 after winning the Rolex Paris Masters, an ATP Masters 1000 event, the November before.

But one of his most impressive performances came in a loss. At the 2018 US Open, Khachanov pushed Rafael Nadal to the limit in a four-hour, 23-minute loss over four sets.

“I always am thinking about New York. It’s one of my favourite Slams, I would say, especially Arthur Ashe Stadium. The match against Rafa that I played in 2018, the emotions, the adrenaline, it is one of the good ones to remember,” Khachanov said. “That’s why coming back to New York I always want to do well.”

It is performances like those that make Khachanov confident on court. The 27th seed still believes he can compete with anyone on his best day.

“That’s a very important thing, first of all to believe in yourself, to believe in your abilities, what you can do when you play at your best, where you can be and which players you can beat, how far you can go. That’s obviously one of the mental parts, [the] self-belief that you can do well,” Khachanov said. “You can go out there and still lose a match and there is no shame in losing it. It’s the belief that you can go deep and win it all. That’s what it takes and that’s a really important part of my game and tennis in general.”

To Khachanov, his game is like a puzzle made of components, with some related to his physical tools and others to the mental side of the sport.

“All those parts are really important to put together,” Khachanov said. “[With them] I can achieve what I’m dreaming of.”

The next step in achieving those dreams will be to defeat Montreal champion Pablo Carreno Busta on Sunday at Flushing Meadows.

Cameron Norrie maintained his perfect record at this year’s US Open on Saturday, overcoming #NextGenATP Dane Holger Rune 7-5, 6-4, 6-1 to reach the fourth round in New York for the first time.

The seventh-seeded Briton defeated Benoit Paire and Joao Sousa in straight sets in his opening two matches and looked in control again against Rune. Norrie fired 22 winners, struck his groundstrokes consistently and soaked up the 19-year-old’s heavy-hitting to advance after two hours and 13 minutes.

“Holger is not easy. He can go through patches where he is playing pretty passively and then he hits aggressively, so you have to be ready for anything,” Norrie said. “He has great hands and defends really well at times. I think I stayed a lot calmer than he did throughout the big moments in the match.

“My goal today was to get to two hours and then start the match from then. When it hit two hours I broke to go 2-1 in the third and I pointed to Facu and said, ‘Now the match starts’…I feel great.”

The 26-year-old has improved to 3-0 in his ATP Head2Head series against Rune, having defeated the Munich champion in Cincinnati last month. Norrie, who is making his sixth appearance at the hard-court major, will next play ninth seed Andrey Rublev or 19th seed Denis Shapovalov.

Norrie arrived in New York in good form after he advanced to the semi-finals in Cincinnati, where he lost to eventual champion Borna Coric. The four-time tour-level titlist is up to No. 11 in the Pepperstone ATP Live Race To Turin as he looks to finish the season strongly and qualify for the Nitto ATP Finals in November.

In a tight first set, Norrie recovered from squandering two set points at 5-3 and a break advantage as he regained his focus to eventually clinch the opener after 49 minutes when Rune hit a forehand long. The seventh seed forced the Dane into errors in the second set with his watertight groundstrokes before he committed just one unforced error in the third set to race away to victory.

Rune, who is fourth in the Pepperstone Live Race To Milan, was aiming to reach the fourth round at a Grand Slam for the second time after he enjoyed a dream run to the quarter-finals at Roland Garros in June.

Top seed and defending champion Daniil Medvedev has set a blockbuster fourth-round US Open showdown with red-hot Australian Nick Kyrgios after defeating China’s Wu Yibing in the early hours of Saturday morning at Flushing Meadows.

Beginning the match close to 11pm after Serena William’s pulsating three-hour final match against Ajla Tomljanovic inside Arthur Ashe Stadium, Medvedev dismissed Wu 6-4 6-2 6-2 to reach the second week for the fourth consecutive year.

Asked what it was like to watch Williams’ farewell performance while waiting to take the court, Medvedev said, “It was a crazy match, close to three hours. It was definitely a pity she lost, but if that’s the last match of her career it was an amazing match and she was close to winning. But Ajla played a great level and congrats to her.”

After Medvedev won a 35-shot rally – the longest of the tournament – to avoid dropping serve in the final game of the second set, the 2020 Nitto ATP Finals champion raced to the finish line, closing out the match in one hour, 55 minutes.

Medvedev will put his World No. 1 Pepperstone ATP Ranking on the line against Kyrgios, who defeated the 26-year-old last month at the ATP Masters 1000 event in Montreal, where he extended his ATP Head2Head lead over Medvedev to 3-1. The 2021 US Open champion currently finds himself behind Rafael Nadal in the Pepperstone ATP Live Rankings and will surrender his No. 1 crown after the tournament if he falls to Kyrgios.

“We’ve played great matches. I think all have been quite tight on the scoreboard,” Medvedev said. “It’s 3-1 to him but I will try to do better this time and it will be a great match for people to watch.

“Tonight I feel like I played at a quite high level and I was serving a little better than him, which was the key. There were a lot of tight games and I felt the level of the match was high.”

Attempting to become the first player to win back-to-back US Opens since Roger Federer won five straight between 2004-08, Medvedev has advanced to the fourth round without dropping a set in the first week. He is also seeking his third appearance in the final at Flushing Meadows, having pushed Nadal to five sets in the 2019 title match.

Medvedev has spent a total of 16 weeks at World No. 1 since February.

Wu is the first Chinese man in the history of the tournament (since 1881) to reach the third round. He has moved to a career-high No. 129 in the Pepperstone ATP Live Rankings as he continues his battle with countryman Zhang Zhizhen (120) to become the first Chinese man to crack the Top 100.

Perhaps only Nick Kyrgios can be showman and business-like at the same time.

The electrifying Aussie charged into the fourth round of the US Open Friday night with plenty of flair and exaggerated celebrations, but with far fewer of his bad-boy antics during a largely focussed 6-4, 6-2, 6-3 win over American J. J. Wolf.

The Wimbledon finalist could next meet World No. 1 Daniil Medvedev in a blockbuster match Sunday as he attempts to reach the quarter-finals at Flushing Meadows for the first time.

The 23rd seed fended off all seven break points he faced, including three at 0/40 in his opening service game of the third set, needing one hour, 54 minutes to sail to victory in front of raucous fans on Louis Armstrong Stadium.

“It was a very tough match for me,” Kyrgios said. “I knew J.J. is a home crowd favourite, I knew I had to be on my guns today and serve well. I’m just really happy to move forward.

“I’m really excited to play Medvedev if he wins,” Kyrgios said in his on-court interview while the World No. 1 was in the first set of his match with Wu Yibing.

Three-weeks ago, Kyrgios extended his ATP Head2Head series lead to 3-1 against Medvedev, after pulling off an upset at the ATP Masters 1000 event in Montreal, Canada.

Both Kyrgios and Wolf entertained the crowd Friday as they engaged in a tug-of-war contest from the baseline, including several passing shots that raised fans to their feet. The Australian struck 21 aces en route to victory, often painting the lines and hitting his targets at ease.

Kyrgios, who improves to 34-9 this season and is 13-2 since his maiden Grand Slam final at the All England Club, has already moved up three places this week to No. 22 in the Pepperstone ATP Live Rankings. Should he advance to the quarter-finals, the 27-year-old would return to the Top 20 for the first time since February 2020.

The Canberra native is inching closer towards regaining his status as the Australian No. 1, a mark that Alex de Minaur currently holds as No. 19 in the Pepperstone ATP Live Rankings.

“I’m doing it (winning) for my team as well, we’ve all been away from home for a while. I’m just playing for a lot of people back home,” Kyrgios said.

Wolf, who upset 16th seed Roberto Bautista Agut on day one, equalled his career-best Grand Slam result by reaching the third round this week in New York.

Kyrgios conquered the third round at the season’s final Slam for the first time in five tries Friday night. He will next face the winner of Medvedev and Wu Sunday.

“At the US Open, this is the furthest I’ve ever gone, so it’s a special year for me already, hopefully I can keep it going” Kyrgios said.