De Minaur’s top-10 ranking in jeopardy after blowing two-set lead in French Open exit

A “burnt out” Alex de Minaur has suffered his earliest grand slam exit in two years, giving up a two-set lead to lose to chaotic Kazakh Alexander Bublik in the second round at Roland-Garros.

Bublik roared to life early in the third set after dropping the first two in an hour of ineptitude to eventually stun ninth-seeded de Minaur 2-6, 2-6, 6-4, 6-3, 6-2 in front of a captivated court 14 crowd that got far more than it bargained for.

This is just the third time in de Minaur’s career that he lost from two sets up – and the first since his heartbreaking fourth-round defeat to Cristian Garin at Wimbledon in 2022.

“[It was] obviously not a good day at the office, and one of those matches that kind of just slipped away without a whole lot of meaning,” de Minaur said.

“I’m just tired, tired mentally. I’m a little bit burnt out, if anything. A lot of tennis [is] being played. In a way, the good thing is that what’s happened today is something like a miracle, right, in the sense that I’m not known for these types of performances, or losing a match like this from two-sets-to-love up.

“I’m probably known for the opposite … [but] saying all this, obviously, I have to have a hard chat with the team and analyse everything that’s been happening, and find a reason for why this happened today.”

Disappointed Demon: Alex de Minaur is out of the French Open in the second round.Credit: Getty Images

De Minaur joins the likes of Casper Ruud and fellow Australian Jordan Thompson in criticising the tour’s punishing schedule, and in particular the mandatory events that can cause players to compete through injury.

“What’s not normal is that for the last three, four years I’ve had two days off after Davis Cup, and I’ve gone straight into pre-season, straight into the new season again,” he said.

The loss snaps the world No.9’s streak of four major quarter-final appearances and places his top-10 ranking in serious jeopardy ahead of Wimbledon, which could place a dent in his chances of a deep run there.

De Minaur’s nine trips to Roland-Garros have now delivered four first-round and four second-round defeats, to go with last year’s shock last-eight run on a surface he had traditionally struggled on. He believes he lost the match more than Bublik won it.

“Looking back at my grand slam career; I can’t think of another match where I felt this way and ended up losing a match that I probably, by all means, shouldn’t have,” de Minaur said.

“It’s not to give credit away from Bublik – he’s extremely dangerous – but saying that, I was also two-sets-to-love
up. This is a match that I win 99.9 per cent of the time. Today was just the odd occasion that it slipped away.”

Adam Walton’s 7-6 (7-1), 6-1, 7-5 second-round loss to Andrey Rublev means Alexei Popyrin, who is preparing for a round-of-32 showdown with Ruud’s conqueror Nuno Borges on Friday, is the last Australian standing in the men’s draw.

Daria Kasatkina, the No.17 seed on the women’s side, is into the third round thanks to a 6-4, 6-2 defeat of France’s Leolia Jeanjean. Up next for the naturalised Australian is 10th seed Paula Badosa.

Momentum: Alexander Bublik steamrolled de Minaur after going two sets down.Credit: Getty Images

As with all Bublik matches, it was predictably wild, offbeat, frenetic, entertaining and at-times uncompetitive – but ended in spectacular fashion with a sustained period of hitting that de Minaur had no answer for.

He flayed 37 of his 51 winners in the final three sets to blow de Minaur away as the Australian’s unforced errors not coincidentally spiked under the sustained assault.

Bublik experienced such a purple patch that he ended the fourth set with a remarkable reflex ’tweener before drilling a down-the-line backhand past de Minaur at the net. He stood in the middle of the court, arms outstretched, and soaked in the crowd’s adoration.

By then, de Minaur was in major trouble, and Bublik’s momentum was like a runaway train.

The Kazakh’s mid-match surge started in similar fashion with an outrageously good point early in the third set, after which he wagged his finger, then bowed once he returned to the baseline. This was the best version of reality TV, unless you were de Minaur.

There were few signs after the first two sets of what was to come, given Bublik’s drop shot obsession and error-filled, rushed play offered such feeble resistance to de Minaur until then.

But his sudden strategic shift from the start of the third set to hit his way out of trouble from the baseline paid immediate dividends.

De Minaur kick-started his downfall with a double fault – one of his eight for the match – that gifted former world No.17 Bublik a 2-0 advantage in the third set.

The Australian No.1’s serving was underwhelming in his first-round win over Laslo Djere and even in the first two sets against Bublik, but became a major problem as the match wore on as the Kazakh went on the attack.

De Minaur in action on the red clay of Paris.Credit: Getty Images

De Minaur landed fewer than half his first serves and will be desperate to correct that for the grasscourt season.

Bublik shelved the drop shot for a period as he regained a foothold in the contest, but then began using it at much wiser junctures as a complementary weapon to his rocket-launcher groundstrokes.

Any hope of de Minaur arresting Bublik’s momentum and swinging the match back in his favour in the final set soon evaporated. He faced a break point in his opening service game, and Bublik went full throttle on an inside-out backhand that de Minaur found too hot to handle.

That break of serve handed Bublik his first lead in the match since 2-0 in the opening set. Consecutive de Minaur errors in the fifth game effectively sealed his fate as his Kazakhstan rival snatched a second break.

Bublik has slipped to 62nd in the rankings and started this fortnight with a 7-13 record for the year, but his best tennis remains breathtaking and can threaten almost anyone on tour.

De Minaur, who remains vulnerable to the world’s biggest hitters, discovered that the hard way as his claycourt campaign ended abruptly, only weeks after announcing he was ready to challenge anyone on the red dirt.

Watch all the action from Roland-Garros live & on-demand on Stan Sport, with two courts in 4K. Coverage of select matches free-to-air on 9GemHD and streaming on 9Now

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