New York will love it if Rafael Nadal can stay the course at the US Open

There are five men who could be world No.1 at the end of the US Open.

The man at the top at the moment is Russian Daniil Medvedev but the most likely to succeed him is Rafa Nadal due to the way computer ranking points drop off after one year.

The great Spaniard has not topped the charts in two-and-a-half years. At 36, Nadal has become as adept at managing his time as he is at managing his game.

He has not lost a grand-slam match that he has started this year. In one of the greatest encounters of all time he beat Medvedev from two sets down to claim the Australian Open in January and he then won a 14th French Open in Paris in June.

At Wimbledon he was unable to take on Nick Kyrgios in their semi-final after another magical five-set victory over Taylor Fritz. The tournament rather deflated at that point.

The others who can be No.1 are Stefanos Tsitsipas, of Greece, Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz and Norwegian Casper Ruud.

They must all reach the final to make it possible. However, the greatest hard-court player of all time will not be playing.

As an unvaccinated foreigner, Novak Djokovic is not allowed to enter the United States. John McEnroe may call it ridiculous, but those are the rules.

There had been much speculation in the locker room Djokovic could drive across the Mexican border and get around this situation that way but that would have been ridiculous and beneath him.

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I am sure he is desperate to go equal with Rafa on 22 grand slams but surely he wouldn’t go to those lengths. One thing we do know is