Aussie teen faces tough first round
Destanee Aiava wants a break from tennis, but first the Melbourne teenager must play on one of the biggest stages in the sport after copping a horror first- round Australian Open draw.
Ashleigh Barty should have little trouble with Belarusian teen Aryna Sabalenka in the first round while Daria Gavrilova plays a qualifier and Samantha Stosur faces Olympic gold medallist Monica Puig.
But it’s 17-year-old Aiava who is set for centre court at her home grand slam after drawing world No.1 Simona Halep in the first round. And unless she focuses, it might get ugly for the world No.193, who claimed her place at Melbourne Park after winning the Australian Open wildcard playoff last month.
Aiava was near tears after a 6-2 6-0 defeat to Eugenie Bouchard at the Kooyong Classic on Thursday, confessing to difficulty concentrating against Canada’s former Open semi-finalist.
‘‘Mentally (I’m) not there but, hopefully, I can get there all together by the first round,’’ she said after the defeat.
‘‘This whole tennis thing is kind of getting to me. Hopefully after the (Australian) Open, I will get a break which is what I want and what I need.’’
Fellow Australian teeanage ace Alex de Minaur is in a much better frame of mind to step up to the challenge of men’s 19th seed Tomas Berdych.
But while de Minaur, 18, is in career-best form after semi-final appearances in Brisbane and Sydney, the big-serving Czech has a strong pedigree, as he showed in winning the Tie Break Tens event against Rafael Nadal on Wednesday.
Matthew Ebden, Jason Kubler and Ajla Tomljanovic must also play seeds first up.
Top-ranked Australian Nick Kyrgios was the big draw winner, opening against world No.100 Rogerio Dutra Silva, with third-seeded Grigor Dimitrov and eighth- seeded Jack Sock his likely main impediments to a semi-final appearance. Thanasi Kokkinakis will face a stern test against fellow next-gen star Daniil Medvedev first up.