Tennis has never been lonelier. Once, talking about New York fans, Boris Becker said: "Here you can do what you want. You can play a saxophone in the stands and nobody cares." But now there's no crowd to spark a fire, no heckler to fuel them, no recognition of a great shot except on the scoreboard.
Zverev breaks Thiem to 5-3 in the fifth set. It's a chance which will become a lament for he is broken by Thiem and will later say: "I was super close to being a Grand Slam champion. I was a few games away, maybe a few points away."
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