Rising star Alex de Minaur hopes he’ll be able to “bring it” against world No.6 Stefanos Tsitsipas after dusting off the cobwebs in Australia’s ATP Cup loss to Spain.
De Minaur was gearing up for a massive showdown against world No.2 Rafael Nadal on Tuesday night, but the 20-time grand slam champion was a late withdrawal with a stiff back.
It meant de Minaur was instead pitted against world No.13 Roberto Bautista Agut, and the Australian took the first set before slumping to a 4-6 6-4 6-4 loss.
De Minaur will be back in action again on Wednesday when Australia take on Greece, with the home side needing to win to keep their ATP Cup title hopes alive.
John Millman will start as hot favourite against world No.462 Michail Pervolarakis, while de Minaur’s Australian Open preparations will be given a stern test when he takes on the highly-fancied Tsitsipas.
Tsitsipas holds a 3-0 edge over de Minaur in head-to-head battles, so the Australian will be aiming to turn the tables.
“He’s a very high-level player, he’s up there for a reason,” de Minaur said.
“I’m looking forward to going out there and testing myself.
“I feel like (against Bautista Agut) I was able to kind of, in a way, dust a bit of the nerves, cobwebs, and I’ll be ready to go. Hopefully I can bring it.”
Although Australia lost 3-0 to Spain at the ATP Cup, the home nation fared much better in the other warm-up events for the Australian Open.
Matt Ebden, Jordan Thompson, James Duckworth, Alexei Popyrin, Andrew Harris, teenager Dane Sweeny, and Nick Kyrgios continued the surge of local successes in the men’s game with round-one wins during the Melbourne Summer Series on Tuesday.
Their triumphs followed Chris O’Connell, Jason Kubler, Aleksandar Vukic, Max Purcell, Alex Bolt and Harry Bourchier as winners so far this week in the three Australian Open lead-up tournaments.
Tennis superstar Ash Barty was also part of the winning fun on Tuesday night, with the Australian world No.1 progressing to the last 16 of the Yarra Valley Classic with a 6-3 6-3 win over Romanian Ana Bogdan.