Australia’s hopes of a men’s Australian Open champions are now the best they’ve been since Lleyton Hewitt’s final in 2005
The last time an Australian man went as far as the Australian Open was Lleyton Hewitt in 2005. 20 years on Aussie’s men have a better chance than any other time in the past two decades of breaking the drought.
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This month marks 20 years since Lleyton Hewitt fell in four sets to Marat Safin in the Australian Open final.
In the two decades since, Australian tennis has not sniffed a male grand slam champion on home soil.
The closest any player has come in that time is Nick Kyrgios, who in 2016 was knocked out in straight-sets at the quarter-final stage by eventual runner-up Andy Murray.
World No.9 Alex de Minaur remains the host country’s best hope of ending an Australian Open title drought dating back to 1976, when Mark Edmondson famously felled fellow Aussie and defending champion John Newcombe at Kooyong.
But a fit Kyrgios would give Australia a dark horse in the race to the coveted piece of silverware that has eluded it for close to half a century.
Kyrgios’ return from an 18-month injury lay-off has divided the wider tennis world but his peers believe the 29 year old can still have a say in the biggest tournaments on the calendar.
“He’s looking good. As long as his wrist holds up and his body holds up, he’s going to be dangerous,” Aussie No.3 and world No.26 Jordan Thompson said from Brisbane this week.
“He’s a freak. He’s got unlimited talent. He’s got that serve. He’s just so hard to play against.
“I’m hoping he stays fit and we see him back on tour, getting inside the top 20, top 10.
“Honestly, I think he’s just lucky to be out there with the wrist injury he had and the surgery. I guess him being on the court is just a bonus in itself.”
Thompson isn’t the only one “hoping” Kyrgios remains fit.
The man himself poured cold water on his Australian Open hopes this week, declaring it would take “a miracle” for his surgically-repaired right wrist to survive the rigours of a grand slam schedule.
That after a three-set epic against French rising star Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard in Brisbane on New Year’s Eve – a match in which few gave him any hope.
Mpetshi Perricard’s subsequent swatting aside of world No.18 Frances Tiafoe two days later put into context just how impressive Kyrgios’ singles comeback was.
He felt fit, healthy, and by his own eye hit his ground strokes as well as he ever has. But the wrist remains a major hurdle.
If we take Kyrgios’ words at face value, he will find the going tough at Melbourne Park in best-of-five-sets tennis.
For Aussie fans, the best approach might be to hope for the best but expect the worst.
Thankfully, for one of the few times this century, Australia will have multiple title threats in Melbourne.
There is de Minaur and Kyrgios, who between them have shared the title of Aussie No.1 for the past decade.
But last year, for the first time since 1998, Australia ended the ATP season with nine players ranked inside the top 100.
Three men – de Minaur, Alexei Popyrin (No.24) and Thompson (No.26) – sit inside the top 30.
Popyrin disappointed in Brisbane this week, bowing out in the first round to his kryptonite, Italian Matteo Arnaldi. But following a breakthrough Masters 1000 title last year, the 25 year old has already proven he has the game to go all the way.
That magical run in Montreal included a host of serious scalps including Ben Shelton, Grigor Dimitrov, Hubert Hurkacz, Sebastian Korda and Andrey Rublev in the final.
Kyrgios’ return from an 18-month injury lay-off has divided the wider tennis world but his peers believe the 29 year old can still have a say in the biggest tournaments on the calendar.
Add a US Open third round defeat of reigning champion Novak Djokovic to that list and Popyrin’s 2024 was comfortably a career-best year – with more to come, he says.
“I’ve still got a lot to gain in terms of physicality, in terms of my physical growth.
“Once we do that, you need it for slams, you need it for those longer matches, to go deeper in slams. At the ranking I am right now, that’s the focus for the next year, is the slams - make second weeks, put some pressure on the top guys in those tournaments.
“I think Australian tennis is in a really good place right now.
“We have three in the top 30, we have guys in the top 60, 70, who are really putting pressure on that, playing some great tennis.
“What we’ve managed to achieve in the past three years in Davis Cup – two finals, a semi-final – that doesn’t come easy. That comes from us driving each other, making each other better and helping each other.
“Hopefully that leads to grand slams. Demon is kind of leading us in terms of that. He’s made quarter-finals in a lot of slams in the last few years. Hopefully I can join him in that run and we’ll see what happens.”
Hoping to join his countrymen in the grand slam pursuit is Thompson, who captured his maiden ATP title in Los Cabos last February and compiled a career-best campaign of his own to secure himself a seed at the Australian Open for the very first time.
The Sydneysider’s list of 2024 scalps is just as impressive: top-10 stars Alexander Zverev, Casper Ruud, Taylor Fritz and Holger Rune all came undone at the Aussie’s hand last year.
Add fellow top-30 players Sebastian Baez, Ugo Humbert, Jack Draper and the aforementioned Mpetshi Perricard to the mix and the 30 year old compiled a hit list worthy of a deep grand slam run.
After years of middling showings at Melbourne Park, Thompson has a point to prove in 2025.
“Aussie Open hasn’t been my best grand slam, that’s definitely the goal,” he said.
“It’s the only slam I haven’t made it past the second round, singles and doubles.
“I’ve lost a couple of heartbreakers, a couple of tough matches. It just hasn’t happened for me in Melbourne.”
It just hasn’t happened for any Aussies in Melbourne, not for a long time.
But with a trio of top-30 stars leading the charge and a further six – Chris O’Connell (64), Aleksander Vukic (68), Rinky Hijikata (73), Thanasi Kokkinakis (77), James Duckworth (82) and Adam Walton (93) – on the way up, for the first time in a long time there is genuine optimism about the homegrown hopefuls this summer.
And lets not forget our Wimbledon finalist, that man Kyrgios.
Originally published as Australia’s hopes of a men’s Australian Open champions are now the best they’ve been since Lleyton Hewitt’s final in 2005
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