Three big-name locals will be at Tennis Australia’s mercy for next month’s Australian Open after tumbling outside the world’s top 100 this year.
Monday is the entry deadline for the year’s opening grand slam, with at least five Australian men and just one woman, Ajla Tomljanovic (No.33), set to receive direct acceptance based on their singles ranking.
Former world No.1 Ash Barty will not defend her drought-busting Melbourne Park title after retiring in March.
Nick Kyrgios is the host nation’s best hope of winning the 2023 Australian Open.Credit:Getty Images
Daria Saville (54) also would have been in the field if not for the ACL rupture she sustained playing against dual Melbourne Park champion Naomi Osaka in Tokyo in September.
Nick Kyrgios (22), Alex de Minaur (24), Chris O’Connell (78), Jordan Thompson (83) and Thanasi Kokkinakis (94) will be in the men’s main draw.
Jason Kubler (110) needs only a handful of withdrawals to join them, but high-profile trio Alexei Popyrin (122), John Millman (149) and James Duckworth (159) will require wildcards to avoid having to qualify.
Kubler would be comfortably inside the ranking cut-off if not for the ruling body’s decision not to award ranking points at Wimbledon, where he reached the last 16 in a career-best result.
That decision followed Wimbledon banning Russian and Belarusian players in protest of the invasion of Ukraine.
Duckworth, 30, suffered the steepest fall, from a career-high No.46 after this year’s Australian Open, but hip surgery that sidelined him for three months played a role in that.
James Duckworth is set to need a wildcard into next year’s Australian Open.Credit:Eddie Jim
Popyrin, 23, won only five of 22 matches at ATP Tour level in 2022 after hoping to challenge Kyrgios and de Minaur to be Australia’s top player, while 33-year-old Millman’s streak of year-end top-100 finishes ends at four.
TA typically hands out five of the eight singles wildcards in each draw to Australians, leaving tournament boss Craig Tiley and co. to weigh up whether to give two of them to 30-plus veterans.
Millman is one of the sport’s statesmen who made the 2018 US Open quarter-finals and boasts a career-high ranking of 33, while Duckworth reached round two at four Australian Opens.
Aleks Vukic (140) and Rinky Hijikata (168) – Australia’s most promising male prospects – seem certain to be two of the five wildcard recipients in the men’s draw. The main threat to Millman and Duckworth is Victorian Omar Jasika, who put his career on hold when he copped a two-year ban in 2018 for a positive cocaine test.
Jasika returned to the tour this season without a ranking and won 56 matches across Futures and Challenger events to now be ranked No.250.
Others who could be considered are Li Tu (213), Wimbledon doubles champion and Davis Cup representative Max Purcell (224) and 21-year-old Dane Sweeny (251).
There might be even tougher calls to make on the women’s side, where Billie Jean King Cup hero and top-10 doubles star Storm Sanders will surely be guaranteed a wildcard despite slipping to No.240.
Priscilla Hon (156), Jaimee Fourlis (167), Kim Birrell (172), Maddison Inglis (181) – who reached the third round at this year’s Australian Open – and hugely promising Olivia Gadecki (204) will likely compete for the others.
Gadecki is the youngest among that group by at least three years but attracted notoriety last summer when she skipped the grand slam after choosing not to be vaccinated against COVID-19.
