Australian Open Daily: Stan's farewell tour marches on
Reflecting on Wawrinka’s marathon win, Bartunkova shocking Bencic and Cirstea’s war of words with Osaka.
Reflecting on Wawrinka’s marathon win, Bartunkova shocking Bencic and Cirstea’s war of words with Osaka.
Naomi Osaka receives a frosty handshake from Sorana Cirstea after she beat the Romanian to reach the third round of the Australian Open.
Stan Wawrinka wins a marathon five-set thriller against qualifier Arthur Gea, while fellow veterans Novak Djokovic and Marin Cilic advance in straight sets.
Jannik Sinner continued his smooth march toward a potential third straight Australian Open crown on Thursday night, dispatching home favourite James Duckworth 6-1, 6-4, 6-2 with clinical efficiency.
The second seed was relentless throughout, extending his flawless 9-0 record against Australian opponents at Grand Slam events. Sinner faced little trouble on serve, erasing all three break points he encountered, according to Infosys Stats.
“Every match is very difficult, so I’m very happy to be in the next round,” Sinner said in his on-court interview. “I was returning very well today, and my serve was also good, so I’m very happy about my performance. I want to thank you guys [the crowd]. I know I’m not Australian, but you have been very fair to me, so thank you for the support.”
Sealed with an Ace! 👏@janniksin sails into Round 3 with a straight sets win over Duckworth#AusOpen2026
— ATP Tour (@atptour) January 22, 2026
Sinner booked a third-round clash with American Eliot Spizzirri, and while a showdown with rival and World No. 1 Carlos Alcaraz could only come in the final, the Italian couldn’t resist a light-hearted nod to the Spaniard when the topic of drop shots arose.
“I think we all know who has the best drop shots… Carlos, of course,” Sinner said of Alcaraz, with whom he has split the past eight major titles.
The No. 2 in the PIF ATP Rankings, Sinner is aiming to become just the second man in the Open Era — alongside Novak Djokovic — to lift three consecutive Australian Open trophies.
[NEWSLETTER FORM]Stan Wawrinka added another memorable moment to his farewell season on Thursday afternoon at the Australian Open, carving his name into the record books once more.
The 40-year-old Swiss battled past determined French qualifier Arthur Gea 4-6, 6-3, 3-6, 7-5, 7-6(3) in a gripping four-hour, 33-minute encounter to become the oldest man to reach the third round at Melbourne Park since Ken Rosewall achieved the feat at age 44 in 1978. The former World No. 3, who lifted his first of three Grand Slam trophies at the Australian Open in 2014, is set to retire at the end of the season.
“Exhausted… As I told you, it’s my last Australian Open, so I’m trying to last as long as possible,” Wawrinka said in his on-court interview. “I’m not young anymore, so I need your [crowd] energy. It’s an amazing feeling to be on this court and have so much amazing support.”
NOT DONE YET! 🫶@stanwawrinka #AusOpen2026 pic.twitter.com/L6PWpzJy5r
— ATP Tour (@atptour) January 22, 2026
The marathon win marked Wawrinka’s 58th five-set match (31–27), the most of any player in the Open Era, according to the Infosys ATP Win/Loss Index. Drawing on his vast experience, he edged past the 21-year-old Gea, who was contesting his first five-set match at tour level.
Advancing to the third round in Melbourne for the 12th time in his career, Wawrinka will next take on ninth seed Taylor Fritz or Vit Kopriva.
[NEWSLETTER FORM]Marin Cilic reached parity with one of his iconic countrymen after a commanding second-round performance on Thursday at the Australian Open.
With his 6-4, 6-3, 6-2 triumph against Denis Shapovalov at Melbourne Park, the 37-year-old Cilic earned his 599th tour-level victory, drawing him level with former World No. 2 and 2001 Wimbledon champion Goran Ivanisevic for the most wins by a Croatian man in the Open Era.
“I think it is an incredible achievement for any Croatian,” Cilic told ATPTour.com in Melbourne. “I know Goran. When I was working with him he said, ‘Nobody told me I had 599. I would have played another one!’. We were laughing.
“Just fantastic to be in this position. Obviously different careers, different times. We are both different kind of players. But also in order to achieve this number of victories you have to be so consistent for so many years. So it’s a great achievement for a Croatian.”
Cilic, himself a former No. 3 in the PIF ATP Rankings and a Grand Slam titlist at the 2014 US Open, can hit another milestone on Saturday in Melbourne. He will bid to surpass Ivanisevic and notch his 600th tour-level win when he faces 12th seed Casper Ruud or Jaume Munar. The Croatian would become just the second active player to hit 600 wins after Novak Djokovic.
[NEWSLETTER FORM]With high temperatures and very high UV levels at the Australian Open, BBC Sport looks at the effects of playing for hours outdoors.
Novak Djokovic cruised to a convincing second-round victory Thursday at the Australian Open, where the record 10-time champion downed Francesco Maestrelli 6-3, 6-2, 6-2.
Playing just his second match since winning his 101st tour-level title in Athens in November, the 38-year-old moved efficiently as ever and struck the ball cleanly throughout the afternoon, a positive sign for the Serbian’s form in the early stages of the tournament.
Djokovic, who claimed his 100th match win at the Australian Open in the opening round, needed seven set points to clinch the 47-minute opener. Rarely relinquishing control in baseline rallies, Djokovic will be pleased with his dominant serving display, having won 86 per cent (43/50) of his first-serve points.
When faced with two break points in his opening service game of the second set, Djokovic drew forehand return errors from the 23-year-old qualifier, who before the match called his clash against the 24-time major titlist “one of the most exciting things of my life”.
Djokovic is now one win shy of 400 victories at Slam level. Should he defeat his next opponent, Botic van de Zandschulp or Shang Juncheng, Djokovic will become the first player to record 400 major match wins. Van de Zandschulp stunned Djokovic last year at the ATP Masters 1000 event in Indian Wells, tying their Lexus ATP Head2Head series at 1-1. Djokovic has never faced Shang.
Making his 21st appearance at Melbourne Park, Djokovic is seeded to meet Italian Lorenzo Musetti in the quarter-finals and two-time defending champion Jannik Sinner in the last four.
Musetti flew past countryman Lorenzo Sonego 6-3, 6-3, 6-4 to match his career-best result at the season’s first major. The fifth seed created 23 break chances, converting six, according to Infosys Stats. Musetti, 23, will next meet 31st seed Stefanos Tsitsipas or Czech Tomas Machac.
[NEWSLETTER FORM]One moment can change everything.
That was the case for Ethan Quinn last January at the ATP Challenger event in Cleveland. Despite starting the year by making a final as a qualifier in Canberra, the American failed to qualify for the Australian Open and then lost in the first round in Cleveland.
“I lost in Cleveland and I wasn’t even in Dallas yet. So I could have definitely checked out a little bit. I could have been like, ‘Oh, woe is me’,” Quinn told ATPTour.com. “I could have been sticking around there in Cleveland and not doing the right things. And then I would have gotten to Dallas maybe and not been prepared to play Dallas and then lost.”
To the American, that would have been two weeks wasted. But instead he reflected on his loss and realised he had played “a pretty good match” and simply was not the better player on the day against Colton Smith.
“Then I had people around me the next day. I was on top of it with my gym workouts, I was on court for a few hours that day with Brian, working on the things that maybe I could have improved on,” Quinn said. “I was able to make the most of it by getting into Dallas qualies and then qualifying in and winning my first-round match and from there, just kind of exploding.”
Entering last year’s ATP 500 event in Dallas, Quinn was the No. 199 player in the PIF ATP Rankings. By June he was in the Top 100 for the first time.
It was not that he had hit rock bottom or anything of the sort. Quinn simply had two roads to go down in Cleveland and chose the path of discipline and hard work, which led to a breakthrough.
“It was just, after a loss like that, being able to find a way to still make sure I got better that week and then get to the next week improved,” Quinn said. “Rather than losing and then finding an excuse or a reason to be complacent. I think having that trust in my team and them holding me accountable to continue to get better, that was the difference from that moment on for the rest of the year.”
Quinn’s coach, Brian Garber, used the loss as an opportunity. The former college tennis star at the University of Georgia was then able to qualify in Dallas and win a round in the main draw.
“I think managing success is harder than managing failure. He had an awesome start in Canberra, but after that Cleveland loss, I told him we weren’t going to change a single thing we were doing,” Garber said. “We changed our mentality to get away from [focusing on the] results. Our goal I text him every night before matches is, ‘Become closer to the version of EQ you want to be tomorrow’.
“That’s not a results-based goal. And we hammered that down so much last year and it started there.”
[NO 1 CLUB]While Quinn rose quickly, that did not mean he was always ecstatic about his results. Starting at Mallorca in June, he lost in the second round of five consecutive tournaments.
“I was really frustrated that I continued to lose, qualifying to an event and winning the first round and losing in the second round or losing to the same players multiple times throughout the year,” Quinn said. “I really had I’m not going to say a meltdown, but I was really frustrated that I felt like I was very stuck in the same spot, that I was continuing to lose in the same place.”
“He was getting mental about not getting past second rounds and one of the reasons was part of his growth,” Garber said. “At the summer Masters he was winning really good matches first round and playing really good players next. I told him his next progression was being more clinical in early rounds, not giving away sets and wearing himself down. [It was about] competing truly point to point, so that when he got to the second round he had energy.
“I also reminded him his path through Challengers and Futures was the same. It started with winning a round or two, falling. Next step he started winning those or finals. Nothing is changing now, it’s just happening at a higher level.”
That showed itself in the first round of the Australian Open against 23rd seed Tallon Griekspoor. The Dutchman won their first two Lexus ATP Head2Head meetings last year, but Quinn returned the favour with a 6-2, 6-3, 6-2 triumph in Melbourne to earn a second-round showdown with Hubert Hurkacz.
“To now be in this situation today, where it’s against a tough player, against a player that’s kind of had my number in the past,” Quinn said. “To be able to get through that match is really refreshing.”
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