Big guns Samantha Stosur, Daria Gavrilova and Ashleigh Barty are Australia’s last French Open singles hopes following a disastrous showing by the men.
A straight-sets elimination for teenage wildcard Alex de Minaur has completed a first-round wipe-out for Australia’s Davis Cup stars.
De Minaur succumbed 6-2 6-4 6-3 to British 16th seed Kyle Edmund to join Bernard Tomic, Jordan Thompson, Matt Ebden, John Millman and James Duckworth in failing to progress past round one.
Australian No.1 Nick Kyrgios didn’t even start after withdrawing on the eve of his much-anticipated first-time confrontation with Tomic with an elbow injury.
Stosur and Gavrilova are the only two Australian winners so far, with Barty to launch her title assault later on Tuesday against Russian Natalia Vikhlyantseva.
Stosur powered into the second round for the 12th straight year with a 6-2 6-4 victory over former US Open semi-finalist Yanina Wickmayer.
Unseeded for the first time in Paris for the first time in a decade, Stosur clubbed 21 winners, five aces and broke Wickmayer five times in another typically strong start to her 14th Open campaign.
The veteran clay-courter’s only lapse came when she dropped serve from 40-15 up at 4-2 in the second set.
But Stosur broke straight back before closing out the match after one hour and 27 minutes.
“Yanina can be really dangerous, but overall I was really pleased with how I stuck at it and played today,” Stosur said.
“At grand slams, there’s never usually too many straight matches where everything just goes your way and you don’t have to worry about anything.
“There’s those moments where you’ve got to fight through it. So, yeah, I’ll take it.”
The four-time semi-finalist and 2010 runner-up next plays either Polona Hercog or Romania or Russian 30th seed Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova.
A third-round showdown with 2016 champion Garbine Muguruza looms large after the Spanish third seed also scored an impressive straight-sets victory on Tuesday – 7-6 (7-0) 6-2 over 2009 winner Svetlana Kuznetsova.
Gavrilova had to stage a tense fightback to join Stosur in advancing.
The 24th seed battled back from a set and a service break down to defeat Romanian Sorana Cirstea 4-6 7-6 (7-4) 6-3 in a niggly encounter.
Gavrilova looked like suffering her third consecutive first-round exit at Roland Garros before turning the match around after a 45-minute rain delay.
She was staring down the barrel and, not for the first time, fighting her own mental demons while trailing 2-0 in the second set.
But the 24-year-old pulled herself together to progress to a second-round meeting with American Bernarda Pera.
Victories for Stosur and Gavrilova finally restored some pride to Australian tennis following the mass exodus of the men, as well as Ajla Tomljanovic on day one.
Millman lost 7-5 6-4 6-2 to Canadian prodigy Denis Shapovalov after holding handy leads in the first two sets on Court Suzanne-Lenglen.
He blew a 5-2 advantage in the opening set, then a 3-1 buffer in the second.
Continuing his comeback from foot surgery, Duckworth put up a fight against third seed Marin Cilic before bowing out 6-3 7-5 7-6 (7-4) to the 2018 Australian Open finalist and 2017 Wimbledon runner-up.
Resuming his match that was suspended at two sets a piece on Monday night due to thunderstorms, Ebden eventually lost 6-4 5-7 6-2 3-6 6-2 to Italian Thomas Fabbiano.
Women’s wildcard Isabelle Wallace’s grand-slam main-draw debut lasted just 52 minutes with the 21-year-old crashing to a 6-1 6-0 loss to Belgian Alison Van Uytvanck.