Alex de Minaur’s uneven season has hit another road bump as Australia’s number one succumbed to a shock last-16 loss at the Barcelona Open.
On a day when Carlos Alcaraz shelved his latest bid to quickly regain the world number one spot from Jannik Sinner, withdrawing from Barcelona with a wrist injury, de Minaur missed a chance to cash in on the Spaniard’s absence as he suffered a deflating 6-4, 6-3 loss to world number 88 Hamad Medjedovic.
Fresh from his promising clay-court season opener in the Monte Carlo Masters, where he had reached the quarterfinals only to lose a match he felt he should have won against Valentin Vacherot, de Minaur had explained how he was keen to kick on as the third seed at the Real Club de Tenis Barcelona.
However, de Minuar only managed to land 36 per cent of his first deliveries and coughed up 25 unforced errors to succumb in an hour and 35 minutes to the 22-year-old Serb prospect.
There was clear frustration for the world number seven de Minaur that he could not find a way back into the match in the second set, especially when he held break point at 4-3 and then had an umpiring call and video review go against him when he thought he had broken.
In all, he won just one of nine break points, and Medjedovic reeled off those final three games to earn one of the biggest victories of his young career, reaching his first ATP 500 quarterfinal.
De Minaur has struggled since his triumph at the Rotterdam Open in February, suffering early exits in Acapulco, Indian Wells and Miami before securing much-needed back-to-back wins in Monte Carlo last week.
But his Barcelona exit felt like a missed chance with Alcaraz, the top seed, withdrawing after his wrist troubled him during his first-round win over Finland’s Otto ‌Virtanen.
AAP