US Open celebrate record attendance - and ESPN cheers for Serena Williams
The US Open celebrated a new attendance record in its 2022 edition - and thanks to the farewell to Serena Williams, ESPN also has reason to be happy.
by Florian Goosmann
last edit: Sep 12, 2022, 08:00 pm
776,120 spectators attended the two main draw weeks at the US Open 2022 - a new record. And not too close: The past record from 2019 was 737,872 fans. This year, around 40,000 more spectators were at the Flushing Meadows facility to witness the farewell of Serena Williams and the arrival of Carlos Alcaraz.
For the entire three weeks of the tournament, including qualification and fan week, there are even 888,044 fans in the statistics; In 2019 there were 853,227.
It is said that for the first time in Arthur Ashe Stadium's 25-year history, every session was sold out. 23,859 spectators fit into the largest tennis stadium in the world...
Serena Williams makes ESPN cheer
The US television channel ESPN also has reason to celebrate: Serena Williams' farewell match against Ajla Tomljanovic was watched by an average of 4.6 million viewers - making it the most-watched TV match in the channel's history. In the meantime, even 6.9 million fans were there.
Roger Federer and Andy Murray held the previous record with the Wimbledon final in 2012, when ESPN reported exclusively and completely from London for the first time.
ESPN also had a reason to celebrate in general: 1.1 million viewers tuned in on the first five days, an increase of 101 percent compared to 2021. And at the same time the most watched first five days on ESPN of the US Open.
ESPN had secured the exclusive coverage of the US Open from 2015. By then (and since 1968), CBS had been one of the four major regular television networks in the United States.