Alexei Popyrin and James Duckworth have led a charge of seven Australian men into the second round of Wimbledon qualifying at Roehampton.
Australian No.6 Popyrin easily dispatched Argentine Federico Coria 6-2 7-5, while Duckworth beat local hopeful Jan Choinski 6-1 7-5 at the Bank of England Sports Centre on Monday.
Spain-based Popyrin hadn’t played on grass for three years before this year, but he says he’s starting to get the hang of the softer surface.
“Last time I played on grass was 2016 juniors,” he said while speaking with Tennis Australia after his match.
“Got to get the hang of moving a little bit on it, slipped a couple of times. But I like the grass, I think it suits my game pretty well.”
Duckworth hopes to do even better when he plays Croatian Vitor Galovic in the second round.
“There’s a lot of things I still need (to do) to get better – I do feel like though the last probably three weeks I’ve started to play a lot better,” the Australian No.9 said.
“(I) played a couple of good matches last week in Ilkley and I’m hoping to improve every match.”
Five other Australians will join the pair in the next round, with four of them enjoying straight sets victories.
Australian No.10 Jason Kubler beat Swiss ace Henri Laaksonen 6-2 5-7 7-5, while Marc Polmans dispatched Egyptian Mohamed Safwat 6-1 6-3 to book a date with South Korean Kwon Soonwoo in the second round.
Compatriot John-Patrick Smith cruised past Frenchman Nicolas Mahut 6-3 6-4 to set up a clash with Italian ace Salvatore Caruso.
Australian Akira Santillan beat Austrian Jurij Rodionov 6-3 6-1 to book a match with Belgian Ruben Bemelmans.
Andrew Harris, in his bid for a maiden appearance at Wimbledon, will play Ukrainian Sergiy Stakhosky after easing past Spaniard Enrique Lopez Perez 6-2 7-5.
“I really want to do well,” Harris said.
“So it was more just about staying in the moment and controlling my emotions and I think I did that really well today and stayed really relaxed and played well.”
Meanwhile, Australian Alex Bolt was amid a marathon qualification slog with Italian Jannik Sinner at 2-6 7-5 10-9 on Monday evening.