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… Australia’s day three recap continued …
There were torturous late-night losses suffered by Daria Kasatkina and Kimberly Birrell, but Australia still has six women in the second round.
Nikola Bartunkova defeated Kasatkina 7-6 (7), 0-6, 6-3 in a topsy-turvy contest. And Maddison Inglis who defeated Birrell 7-6 (6), 6-7 (9), 6-4 in an all-Australian clash that lasted three hours.
But in exciting news, earlier Dane Sweeny and James Duckworth increased the count of Australian men in the second round to five. Duckworth outlasted the Croatian lucky loser Dino Prizmic in five sets by winning the last two.
Sweeny, 24, shared a compelling meeting of opposites which also marked the final appearance at Melbourne Park for the French veteran Gaël Monfils. The Australian dropped to the ground in elation after defeating the 39-year-old from France 6-7 (3), 7-5, 6-4, 7-5
Australia day three recap
OK tennis, yes! There were shocks, heartbreak and elation as one little known local knocked out a much-loved veteran.
It started with Australia’s top-ranked women’s singles player, Maya Joint, losing her opening match to Tereza Valentova in straight sets 6-4, 6-4. She was understandably devasted by vowed to come back stronger.
Then, local wildcard Taylah Preston defeated China’s Shuai Zhang, 6-3, 2-6, 6-3, which was her first grand slam win ever! Preston now meets 13th seed Linda Noskova of Czech Republic.
Before I get into any kind of day three tennis recapping, we need to take a moment for the outfit of the day (or maybe of the tournament?).
Of course it was the one and only Naomi Osaka who completely stole the show with her entrance on to Rod Laver for the final match of the evening session.
Guardian journalist Matilda Boseley messaged me urgently about this, and summarised my feelings well.
Literally screaming crying throwing up over Osaka’s outfit. Amazing.
More players need to get around this walk-on outfit trend. Maybe Sinner could dress up as a mustard bottle.
Preamble
Jo Khan
Hello and welcome to our Australian Open day four blog. I’m Jo Khan and I’m here to bring you the action from women’s No 1 Aryna Sabalenka v Zhuoxuan Bai who are up first on Rod Laver Arena this morning.
Then my colleague Joey Lynch will take over to cover the men’s No 1 Carlos Alcaraz v Yannick Hanfmann following on centre court.
The two top singles players breezed through their opening matches – and the same is certainly expected for Sabalenka today. Alcaraz faces the No 102 ranked men’s singles player who may make him work for it a little more.
It’s overcast in Melbourne this morning, and considerably cooler than yesterday, which I imagine both players and spectators will be happy about.
Any thoughts, please do send me an email to jo.khan@theguardian.com.
Let’s go!
English (US) ·