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Alex de Minaur has decided to make a swift return to action after the deflation of another early French Open exit, opting to try to regain a Dutch grass-court title he won in 2024 to regenerate his season.
The downcast Australian No.1 reckoned he didn’t know whether to take a break from the sport or “get back on the bike” straight away after his four-set loss to Jakub Mensik in the third round at Roland Garros.
But he’s plumped for getting in some key pre-Wimbledon match time at ‘s-Hertogenbosch, the traditional Dutch tournament where he won two years ago before going on to the quarter-finals at Wimbledon later.
Last year, he opted to give the event a miss after feeling down in the dumps following his second-round exit in Paris to Alexander Bublik, but after discussions with his team, he’s this time taken a wildcard invite from the Netherlands organisers.
It was there where de Minaur enjoyed the 11th title of his career by winning the Rotterdam Open in February, but his season has largely gone downhill since.
World No.7 de Minaur will be one of three top-10 players in the ATP 250 field for the event that begins on Saturday with qualifiers, along with No.6 Felix Auger-Aliassime and No.8 Daniil Medvedev.
De Minaur is a typical Aussie player in that he usually can’t wait to get away from the so often unrewarding slog of clay-court tennis so he can head for the grass – and Taylah Preston knows how he feels.
The country’s No.6-ranked woman player Preston played two tour-level matches on clay this Spring and lost them both, including her first-round qualifier in the French Open at Roland Garros.
But the promising 20-year-old West Australian seemed refreshed by the lure of a bit of grass-court tennis as she took the cross-Channel trip and threw herself into the Birmingham Open WTA 125 event at Edgbaston Priory.
After defeating Briton Alicia Dudeney in the first round, she defeated another home player Katie Swan in the round-of-16 on Thursday (Friday AEST).
But playing in her first quarter-final at this level since she reached the semis in the much bigger WTA 250 event in Hobart at the start of the year, she couldn’t go any further as she bowed out 2-6 6-3 6-4 to American Ashlyn Krueger.
Preston, one of a host of Australians hoping to battle through Wimbledon qualifying for a prized spot at the grass-court slam, is set to rise to a new career-high at No.126 after her Birmingham run.
In the equivalent men’s Challenger event there, Rinky Hijikata also made the quarters, but was defeated by British ‘Aussie slayer’ Arthur Fery, who, fresh from defeating Murray Bridge veteran Alex Bolt 6-4 6-7 (5-7) 6-3 in the previous round, took care of Sydney’s fifth seed 7-6 (9-7) 6-3.
