Aussie Demon runs hot
ALEX de Minaur is off to a strong start at the Queen’s Club Championships as he looks to at least match his semi-final run last year at the traditional Wimbledon lead-in event.
The 23-year-old extended his perfect record against eighth-seeded Reilly Opelka to five matches, easing past the 211cm American 6-4 6-4 to win his first grass-court contest of the season.
Australia’s de Minaur absorbed six Opelka aces to break him once in each set without conceding his own serve, putting last week’s early exit at ’s-Hertogenbosch behind him.
He will next play junior peer Alejandro Davidovich Fokina, who defeated fellow Spaniard Albert Ramos-Vinolas in straight sets.
The Queen’s Club draw is suddenly wide open, with Opelka joining fellow seeds Taylor Fritz and Cameron Norrie on the scrap heap.
But the defending champion and man who ended 21stranked de Minaur’s title hopes last year, Italy’s Matteo Berrettini, is again on the Australian’s side of the draw and fresh from winning last week’s Stuttgart Open.
In Berlin, Australian qualifier Daria Saville outlasted Jil Teichmann 6-7 (2-7) 7-5 6-2 to ensure she will end an almost three-year stint riddled with foot-related injuries outside the top 100.
Saville is likely to meet Greek second seed Maria Sakkari in round 2, while Nick Kyrgios is set to face Germany’s Daniel Altmaier as the sole Aussie in the Halle draw.
Kyrgios, who made the Stuttgart semi-finals, will almost certainly take on Greece’s Stefanos Tsitsipas if he accounts for Altmaier.
Elsewhere, 21-year-old Rinky Hijikata qualified for the Ilkley Challenger main draw but last week’s Nottingham semi-finalist Alexei Popyrin fell short. Hijikata faces compatriot Jordan Thompson if they can defeat first-up opponents Andreas Seppi and Nuno Borges.
John Millman and Jason Kubler, who returned to the top 100 this week, are also in the Ilkey men’s draw, while Priscilla Hon qualified for the women’s event, but Alexandra Osborne lost a match tie-break heartbreaker.
Thompson’s perfect start to the grass-court season and bid for back-to-back titles ended in the Nottingham final but he remains thrilled with his form ahead of Wimbledon.
The third-seeded Sydneysider, who was as high as No.43 in the world, sent down eight aces before losing 6-4 6-4 to No.1 seed Dan Evans in a match lasting almost two hours.
Fellow Australian Kubler, who, like Thompson, was gunning for consecutive Challenger titles, retired from the Orlando Open final with stomach issues while trailing China’s Yibing Wu 6-7 (5-7) 6-4 3-1. But Kubler, who qualified for this year’s French Open, is projected to return to the top 100 for the first time in almost four years.