{"id":875747,"date":"2026-08-29T11:34:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-29T11:34:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/875747\/"},"modified":"2026-08-29T11:34:09","modified_gmt":"2026-08-29T11:34:09","slug":"keep-off-the-grass-british-tennis-players-complain-of-marijuana-smell-at-us-open-us-open-tennis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/875747\/","title":{"rendered":"Keep off the grass: British tennis players complain of marijuana smell at US Open | US Open tennis"},"content":{"rendered":"

Britain\u2019s US Open hopefuls thought they had put the grass behind them when Wimbledon finished, but the smell of it is all around Flushing Meadows and they are not happy about it.<\/p>\n

Marijuana is legal for adults in New York<\/a> and while smoking is not allowed on site, the aroma of weed wafts over some outside courts from the nearby Corona Park.<\/p>\n

Katie Boulter, the British No 1, said: \u201cYeah, I have experienced it. You go down to the practice courts and down in the park courts, you do smell it a lot. But, yeah, I\u2019m not a huge fan of it. I know a lot of players have complained on some of the specific courts.<\/p>\n

\u2018I\u2019m trying to focus and then obviously, it takes you out of the moment. You don\u2019t need distractions,\u2019 says Katie Boulter of the aroma of weed wafting over the US Open outside courts. Photograph: Seth Wenig\/AP<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve played on one before and I did smell it during my match. It\u2019s something that I wouldn\u2019t like to smell in the middle of my match. I\u2019m trying to focus and then obviously, it takes you out of the moment and you really don\u2019t want to. You don\u2019t need distractions. So yeah, I wasn\u2019t a huge fan of it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fran Jones, the British No 3, recalled: \u201cLast year I made a joke about that, in my first round, and I said to the guy: \u2018Is this normal?\u2019. Because I was on the stadium, and it\u2019s next to the park. He\u2019s like: \u2018Yeah\u201d. and I was: \u2018Well, no wonder I\u2019m playing pretty well\u2019. This year I\u2019ll be like: \u2018No, lock in, lock in!\u201d<\/p>\n

Harriet Dart, who came through qualifying along with Jones, added: \u201cI mean it\u2019s New York. It\u2019s New York. I feel like everywhere you walk around, it\u2019s everywhere, no? It is what it is. Same for everyone.\u201d<\/p>\n

The USTA said in a statement: \u201cWhile we can\u2019t control what takes place off the grounds of the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis<\/a> Center, we continue to be vigilant as we maintain this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fery sails into first ATP final against Buse<\/p>\n

Arthur Fery has reached the first ATP Tour final of his career at the Winston-Salem Open after his semi-final opponent, James Duckworth, retired due to injury.<\/p>\n

Fery led 6-4, 1-2 when Duckworth withdrew because of an apparent right \u200bleg injury. The Wimbledon semi-finalist broke his Australian opponent at 4-4 in the first set, with the second set on serve until Duckworth retired.<\/p>\n

The Briton will face Peru\u2019s Ignacio Buse in Saturday\u2019s final in North Carolina, after he edged past France\u2019s Benjamin Bonzi 6-2, 4-6, 6-1. Buse is one place above Fery in the world rankings at No 36, and is the 32nd seed at the upcoming French Open.<\/p>\n

Fery, who narrowly missed out on being seeded in New York, faces a tough opening test on his main-draw US Open debut against the world No 14, Lorenzo Musetti. Reuters<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Britain\u2019s US Open hopefuls thought they had put the grass behind them when Wimbledon finished, but the smell…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":875748,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[49,48,82,593],"class_list":["post-875747","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/875747","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=875747"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/875747\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/875748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=875747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=875747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=875747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}