A few moments of madness may have cost Alex de Minaur a trip to the second round of the Japan Open after the Australian missed a regulation smash and then destroyed his racquet in the deciding set of his match with Lloyd Harris.
In scenes more reminiscent of a Nick Kyrgios match, de Minaur gifted the South African two points with his fluffed shot, immediately compounding the error by trashing his racquet and being docked a point penalty.
The world No.24 had already received a code violation and warning, thus incurring a point loss in the second instance.
It changed the complexion of the match, de Minaur going from up a mini-break in the final tiebreaker to being down one in the blink of an eye.
While he quickly calmed down and even managed to hold two match points on his opponent’s serve, the damage was largely done as Harris eventually closed out the match 6-3 6-7 (8-6) 7-6 (10-8).
It was an unfortunate ending for the Australian No.1, who was coming off the back of his third ATP title win in Wuhan.
The towering South African largely had his measure and wasn’t broken throughout the match.
But de Minaur refused to go away, hanging tough in the second set tiebreak when Harris had two serves to take the match before scrapping his way to a deciding set tiebreak.
The loss means he’ll miss out on a second round match with countryman John Millman who fought back from a set down against Adrian Mannarino.
Millman played the big points better to prevail 4-6 6-3 6-4 in two hours and eight minutes.
The world No.80 saved four of the five break points he faced and took advantage on two of his opportunities, one in each of the second and third sets, and closed out the match with his sixth ace.
Mannarino, the runner-up in Tokyo two years ago, was a finalist last week in Zhuhai – falling in straight sets to de Minaur.
Belgian third seed David Goffin accounted for Spain’s Pablo Carreno Busta 1-6 7-6 (10-8) 6-0 in the first match to conclude on Wednesday.