{"id":430180,"date":"2026-01-22T15:07:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-22T15:07:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/430180\/"},"modified":"2026-01-22T15:07:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-22T15:07:11","slug":"same-old-feeling-for-mensik-musetti-the-leading-lorenzo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/430180\/","title":{"rendered":"Same old feeling for Mensik, Musetti the leading Lorenzo"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cRafa, I mean, he showed really, really good performance, good run here in AO,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven before in Canberra [he reached the final and] he won couple of Challengers before. So, yeah, it’s great to see him, great to see all of them coming on tour and coming to compete.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fifth seed Lorenzo Musetti<\/a> also enjoyed a smooth day out after breezing past Italian compatriot Lorenzo Sonego 6-3 6-3 6-4 at Margaret Court Arena.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

The 23-year-old, who has reached at least the quarterfinals at the other three majors, had to put friendship aside to book his second-straight AO third-round berth.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was not an easy match to prepare, to play and to deal with because Lorenzo is one of my best friends on tour,\u201d Musetti said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe recently had a title together in doubles [in Hong Kong], so we shared a lot of nice memories, so it’s not easy to separate those things in the court.\u201d<\/p>\n

Musetti\u2019s fellow 23-year-old, eighth seed Ben Shelton<\/a>, ended an inspired Dane Sweeny\u2019s bid for a maiden Grand Slam third round at John Cain Arena.<\/p>\n

The American \u2013 a semifinalist at Melbourne Park last year \u2013 took down the Australian 6-3 6-2 6-2.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that you run into guys that are playing at a very high level, playing some of their best tennis when you get there, and certainly every matchup is different,\u201d Shelton said.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou know, going from a quarters playing somebody to [Jannik] Sinner in a semis, that’s a different problem to deal with, but I think that that’s kind of just the normal being out on tour.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have so many different matchups, and you have to bring something different to every match.\u201d<\/p>\n

Late-blooming Valentin Vacherot <\/a>is next, after the 30th seed brought down Australian Rinky Hijikata 6-1 6-3 4-6 6-2 at Kia Arena on Thursday.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

It continued a whirlwind six months for the 27-year-old, following a surprise first Masters 1000 title in Shanghai over his cousin, Arthur Rinderknech, in October.<\/p>\n

The win made Vacherot the first from Monaco to reach the third round at a Slam and further proof his unlikely title run in China was no flash in the pan.<\/p>\n

\u201cI’m sure so many people thought it was just the one week. Then even though I did well after in Paris as well, it was probably just about my confidence of the moment, so I’m just happy to win as many matches as I can,\u201d Vacherot said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just play tennis and try to play as good this season and every tournament. We’ll see. We do the counts at the end.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cRafa, I mean, he showed really, really good performance, good run here in AO,\u201d he said. \u201cEven before…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":430181,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[565],"tags":[64,63,85,747],"class_list":["post-430180","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/430180","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=430180"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/430180\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/430181"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=430180"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=430180"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=430180"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}