Three locals have been knocked out within the opening spherical of males’s qualifying at Melbourne Park after Australian Open boss Craig Tiley stood by the decision to miss Bernard Tomic for a wildcard.
Jeremy Jin misplaced to Belgium’s Zizou Bergs 7-6 (7-3) 6-1, James McCabe was overwhelmed by Frenchman Alexander Muller 7-6 (7-2) 6-7 (4-7) 7-3 and Derek Pham was knocked out by German Peter Gojowczyk 6-2 6-2.
All three had been chosen forward of Tomic for wildcards.
Tomic, the one-time world No.17, is lacking the Australian Open for the primary time in 16 years.
“It’s our performance team that look at the decision of wildcards,” Tiley instructed reporters on Monday when requested about Tomic.
“What it goes into is the player coming in, or the strength of their play, how they’ve been playing, what events they’ve been playing, how much they’ve been playing. Are they the younger part of our future generation, the younger players?
“There’s many components that go into it and it isn’t a fast resolution they undergo.
“One thing that’s great, we’ve got a new problem, and we’ve got a lot more Australian players than we’ve had before to choose from, and that’s a great, great problem to have.”
Max Purcell, Alex Bolt and wildcards Dane Sweeny and Adam Walton all reached the second spherical.
Purcell was main No.2 seed Marco Cecchinato 6-2 3-2 when the Italian retired whereas Bolt made mild work of Renzo Olvio, taking an hour to beat the Argentine 6-1 6-2.
Walton swept apart Spaniard Pablo Andujar 6-1 6-2 and Sweeny beat Vit Kopriva 6-1 6-1.
In the opening spherical of girls’s qualifying, Destanee Aiava simply accounted for Ipek Oz 6-3 6-3 whereas Zoe Hives beat Harmony Tan 6-2 5-7 6-1.
But Arina Rodionova suffered a troublesome loss to veteran American CoCo Vandeweghe, taking place 6-4 7-6 (10-8).
Wildcard Seone Mendez was knocked out by Elena-Gabriela Ruse in three units 6-1 3-6 6-1, Lizette Cabrera misplaced 6-2 6-3 to Elina Avanesyan and Kaylah McPhee was thrashed 6-4 6-0 by Cristina Bucsa.
American Ashlyn Krueger knocked out former Wimbledon finalist Eugenie Bouchard, successful 6-3 1-6 6-4.
