Jordan Thompson and Alex De Minaur hadensured two Australian men would be in the fourth round of a tournament now guaranteed to have a first-time grand slam winner. However,Thompson,fell in straight sets to 27th seed Borna Coric on Monday. He lost 7-5,6-1,6-3 to leave De Minaur flying the flag.

The United States Tennis Association issued a statement soon after the Djokovic incident.

"In accordance with the grand slam rulebook,following his actions of intentionally hitting a ball dangerously or recklessly within the court or hitting a ball with negligent disregard of the consequences,the US Open tournament referee defaulted Novak Djokovic from the 2020 US Open,"it read.

"Because he was defaulted,Djokovic will lose all ranking points earned at the US Open and will be fined the prize money won at the tournament in addition to any or all fines levied with respect to the offending incident."

Australia's Nick Kyrgios,another star to skip the tournament due to coronavirus concerns,took to Twitter to ponder the likely reaction were he to have been in Djokovic's shoes.

"Swap me for jokers incident,"he wrote."'Accidentally hitting the ball kid in the throat'how many years would I be banned for?"

One man who stands to benefit from Djokovic's absence,Alexander Zverev,sympathised with his rival.

"It's very unfortunate that he hit a line judge and especially where it hit her,"the 23-year-old German said.

"There is a rule in place for it. I think the supervisors are just doing their job but very unlucky for Novak,I think he's going to be a little bit upset about it.

"If you would have hit it anywhere else,if it would have landed anywhere else - we were talking about a few inches - he would have been fine so very unlucky."

The fifth seed slammed down 18 aces en route to demolishing Alejandro Davidovich Fokina 6-2,6-2,6-1.

In the women's draw,Japanese tournament favourite and 2018 champion Naomi Osaka breezed past Estonia's Anett Kontaveit 6-3,6-4 and will meet unseeded American Shelby Rogers in the quarter-finals.

Upsets were otherwise the order of the day,as Rogers eliminated sixth seed and dual Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova 7-6 (7-5),3-6,7-6 (8-6),fighting off four match points to make the last eight at Flushing Meadows for the first time.

Seventeenth seed Angelique Kerber,meanwhile,was bounced out in straight sets by American 28th seed Jennifer Brady,while Petra Martic,the eighth seed,fell in three to No.23 Yulia Putintseva.

with AP,Reuters