Bu Yunchaokete caused a major upset at the US Open: lucky loser convincingly knocked out 12th seed Jodar
Chinese tennis player Bu Yunchaokete produced one of the most striking upsets of the first round of the 2026 US Open, defeating 12th seed Rafael Jodar 6:2, 6:1, 6:1. The match was played on September 2 at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in New York, and according to a report by the EFE news agency, it lasted one hour and 48 minutes of actual play. Bu reached the main draw as a lucky loser after losing to Federico Cina in the final round of qualifying and then receiving a place following the withdrawal of Australian Thanasi Kokkinakis. Instead of a brief appearance in qualifying, the 24-year-old Chinese player was given another opportunity and took advantage of it in a way that completely changed the picture in that section of the draw.
For 19-year-old Jodar, one of the fastest-rising players on the ATP Tour during 2026, the defeat was unexpectedly emphatic. The Spaniard arrived in New York as the world No. 13 and the tournament's 12th seed, after a season in which he won his first ATP title, reached the quarterfinals of Roland Garros and came close to breaking into the world's Top 10. Against Bu, however, he was unable to create a single break point, while the Chinese player constantly attacked his serve and dictated the rhythm from the baseline. Rain stopped the match for almost two hours in the third set, but even the enforced break did not change the balance of power.
Bu imposed a pace from the start that Jodar could not match
The 6:2 score in the first set quickly showed that seeded status and the current ATP ranking would not necessarily translate onto the court. Bu took early control of the rallies, particularly by applying pressure to Jodar's backhand, which the EFE news agency also identified as one of the key tactical elements of the match. The Chinese player was aggressive enough to shorten points whenever he had the opportunity, while at the same time not allowing Jodar to take the initiative on return. In the second set, the advantage became even more pronounced, and with two more service breaks Bu moved to 6:1 and came closer to the biggest victory of his season.
Official US Open statistics and data published by EFE show how large the difference was in the key areas. Jodar offered 16 break points during the match, and Bu converted seven of them, while the Spanish player did not have a single opportunity to break his opponent's serve. EFE reported that Jodar landed 52 percent of his first serves and finished the match with 37 unforced errors and 15 winners, which made any comeback attempt even more difficult. Bu, on the other hand, kept his service games under control and thereby eliminated one of the main mechanisms through which the favorite could have worked his way back into the match. In a best-of-five-set match, that kind of stability quickly turned an initial surprise into a complete runaway on the scoreboard.
Rain disrupted Jodar's first senior US Open twice
Jodar's professional debut in the US Open main draw was marked by weather problems even before the first point. The ATP announced that his match had originally been scheduled for September 1, but because of rain in New York it was moved to the following day. When the match finally began on September 2, another rain delay arrived in the third set with Bu leading 4:1. According to EFE, the interruption lasted almost two hours, but after returning to the court Jodar could not find a way to change the dynamics of the match.
Such breaks sometimes give a trailing player room to regroup tactically and mentally, but this time they had no such effect. After play resumed, Bu remained calm, re-established his rhythm and closed out the match while losing only one game in the third set. The final 6:1 confirmed the dominance that extended across all three sets. Jodar won only four games in the entire match, which stands out particularly sharply compared with the results he had achieved during the previous months against players from the very top of the ATP Tour.
From defeat in qualifying to the biggest opportunity of the tournament
Bu's path to this victory was unusual even by Grand Slam standards. In US Open qualifying he passed the first two hurdles, including a match against Borna Gojo, but in the decisive round he was stopped by 19-year-old Italian Federico Cina 3:6, 6:4, 7:5, according to the ATP Tour's official report. Under normal circumstances, that would have meant his appearance in New York ended before the main tournament began. But the withdrawal of Thanasi Kokkinakis, who according to the original draw was due to play Jodar, opened a place for a lucky loser.
The term lucky loser in professional tennis refers to a player who loses in qualifying but subsequently enters the main draw because someone who had been directly entered withdraws. Such a situation gives the player a second chance, but usually without ideal preparation for the new opponent and with very little time to adjust. In this case, Bu received not only a place in the main draw but also a match against one of the season's most successful young players. Instead of taking a defensive approach against the seed, from the opening games he played like a tennis player with nothing to lose, and that freedom quickly turned into an advantage on the scoreboard.
The victory carries additional significance because of Bu's own position before the US Open. According to the official Australian Open profile, updated shortly before the tournament in New York, Bu was ranked No. 124 in the world, while EFE highlighted that the victory over Jodar was his first at ATP level since October 2025. ATP data show that the Chinese player reached a career-high ranking of No. 64 in April 2025, but over the following period he moved away from that position and built much of his competitive rhythm through Challenger tournaments. In New York, he therefore received a rare opportunity to use a single match to draw attention once again to the tennis that had previously taken him into the world's Top 70.
Jodar arrived in New York after an enormous rise during 2026
The scale of the upset becomes clearer when Jodar's season is considered. Ahead of the tournament, the official US Open described the Spaniard as one of the players who had made the biggest leap on the men's Tour in just one year. At the same point in 2025, he was around No. 369 in the world rankings, was playing for the University of Virginia in the United States and at the same time building experience at Challenger level. By the 2026 US Open, he had climbed to No. 13 in the ATP rankings, while the tournament's official preview listed a season record of 36 wins and 14 losses before his appearance in New York.
He won his first major title in April at the ATP 250 tournament in Marrakech on clay. As the season continued, he showed that his results were not limited to one surface: the official US Open highlighted his run to the Roland Garros quarterfinals, while EFE also noted an ATP 500 final in Washington, a Masters 1000 semifinal in Montreal and a round-of-16 appearance in Cincinnati. Such a run on North American hard courts created expectations that Jodar could also make a deep run in New York. Instead, his senior debut at the tournament ended in the opening round.
The defeat does not erase what Jodar achieved in the first eight months of 2026, but it shows how demanding the transition is from young sensation to permanent member of the world's elite. In a short period, he played a large number of matches on different continents and surfaces, and EFE assessed after the match that he had arrived in New York following a very long series of hard-court tournaments. The number of unforced errors against Bu and the low first-serve percentage can be viewed as concrete indicators of a bad day, without the need for broader conclusions about his form. In professional tennis, one early Grand Slam defeat often says more about a specific combination of performance, opponent and timing than about the long-term direction of a career.
Return to the site of his greatest junior success ended without another celebration
New York holds a special place in Jodar's career so far. At the same complex in Queens in 2024, he won the US Open junior title, then as a 17-year-old. According to the tournament's official archive, in the final he defeated top seed Nicolai Budkov Kjaer of Norway 2:6, 6:2, 7:6(1). The US Open at the time highlighted his comeback after losing the first set and his composed play in the deciding tie-break, with which he secured his first junior Grand Slam title.
Two years later, Jodar returned to Flushing Meadows in a completely different role. He was no longer a junior trying to achieve his first major international result, but a player ranked in the world's Top 15 and a seed in the senior draw. That contrast only amplified the weight of the defeat to Bu: the place where his international breakthrough began this time brought him one of his shortest appearances of the season. Still, the fact that only two years passed between the junior trophy and seeded status at the senior US Open says enough about the speed of his development.
Bu's victory shows how dangerous lucky loser status can be
In major tournament draws, a lucky loser often enters without the expectations placed on seeded players, but with the important advantage of competitive rhythm. Before the main tournament in New York, Bu had already played three qualifying matches, so he was very familiar with the conditions, the hard surface and the speed of the courts. Defeat in the final round of qualifying could have ended his tournament, but his return to the competition allowed him to receive another opportunity practically immediately. Against Jodar, he looked better prepared for the specific match conditions than his ranking would have suggested.
Such stories are an important reminder that a difference in ranking at a Grand Slam does not guarantee control of an individual match. Jodar entered as a player close to the Top 10, with a string of results at major tournaments and experience against established names. Bu arrived after a qualifying defeat and as the world No. 124. Yet on the court it was the Chinese player who was more precise at decisive moments, more successful in his service games and more efficient when break opportunities arose. The 6:2, 6:1, 6:1 score was therefore not the result of the favorite merely losing one set, but of complete control through almost the entire match.
A first Grand Slam victory that can change Bu's season
For Bu, success against Jodar meant his first victory in the main draw of a Grand Slam tournament, after his previous appearances at the biggest events had ended in the first round. ATP data on his 2025 results record main-draw appearances at the Australian Open, Roland Garros, Wimbledon and the US Open without progressing beyond the opening round. In that context, victory over a Top 15 player represents much more than advancement to the second round. It ends a run of failures on the biggest stage and puts Bu back in the spotlight at a tournament for which, only a few days earlier, he had failed to qualify directly.
The financial and ranking-points impact of advancing is also not negligible. The official US Open announced that total player compensation at the 2026 tournament reached 108 million dollars, while prize money in the singles competition increases as players progress through the draw. For a tennis player who spent a large part of the year competing at lower levels of the professional system, every additional Grand Slam match has both sporting and economic value. Even more important may be the psychological effect of beating a seed who entered the tournament as one of the season's young stars.
Jodar's defeat among the first major warnings to seeds in New York
The US Open traditionally produces early defeats for seeds because it is played on a hard court that rewards aggressive serving, early ball-striking and the ability to seize the initiative quickly. In Jodar's case, the problem was not merely that he lost to a lower-ranked player, but the way the match developed. He did not have a break point, failed to slow Bu's momentum after the first set and could not find an effective response to the repeated pressure toward his backhand side. That created a match in which the score became increasingly emphatic as time passed.
For Bu, meanwhile, the most important thing was that he did not become satisfied with his early lead. After winning the first set he did not retreat into defensive play, and after a two-hour rain delay he did not lose concentration. It was precisely his ability to maintain the same approach through interruptions and changes of rhythm that was crucial to finishing without complications. When the final point had been played, the Chinese lucky loser had a result that few could have expected after he had lost the decisive qualifying match only a few days earlier.
For Jodar, the US Open will remain a tournament of major contrasts: in 2024 he won the junior Grand Slam there, while in 2026, as the 12th seed, his senior debut ended in the first round. For Bu, the same match became a turning point, his first Grand Slam victory and one of the most valuable wins of his career so far. He entered New York through the side door, thanks to another player's withdrawal, but on the court he showed without any hesitation that he could justify his place in the main draw.
Sources:
- US Open - official statistics from the Rafael Jodar - Yunchaokete Bu match and data on the course of the match (link)
- Agencia EFE - match report, score, duration, statistics, rain interruption and context on both players (link)
- ATP Tour - US Open preview and information on Jodar's rise, 2026 season and results before the tournament (link)
- Australian Open - Bu's official profile with ATP ranking and basic career information, updated in late August 2026 (link)
- ATP Tour - conclusion of US Open qualifying and Bu's defeat to Federico Cina in the decisive round (link)
- US Open - official overview of Jodar's status, ranking and season ahead of the 2026 tournament (link)
- US Open - official report on Jodar winning the 2024 junior title (link)
- ATP Tour - report on the postponement of Jodar's first-round match because of rain on September 1, 2026 (link)
- US Open - official information on the 2026 US Open prize fund (link)