Rinky Hijikata has enjoyed another landmark moment in his impressive 2023 season, earning his first victory over a top-50 opponent to progress at the Shanghai Masters.
The Sydneysider, who started the season by reaching the men’s doubles final at the Australian Open and has soared from 164 to 75 in the singles rankings over the year, was left celebrating a 7-6 (7-4) 7-5 win over tough Serbian Laslo Djere on Thursday.
Hijikata, buoyed by recently having reached the last-16 at the US Open, had to qualify for the prestigious ATP 1000 event but has made such good progress that he’s now poised to break into the top-70 for the first time next week.
In the next round, the 22-year-old will get the chance to discover the extent of his 2023 progress when he faces world No.6 Stefanos Tsitsipas, who hammered Hijikata for the loss of just five games when they met at the Australian Open in January.
Also through to the second round in Shanghai is Hijikata’s fellow Sydneysider Aleksandar Vukic, who cracked 35 winners en route to beating Spain’s Roberto Carballes Baena 6-4 7-6 (9-7).
Vukic will next face a first career meeting with Grigor Dimitrov, the Bulgarian who’s found a rich vein of form at 32, and if he wins, he’s sure to be back in the world’s top 50 again.
Altogether, there’ll be five Aussies in the round-of-64, with Thanasi Kokkinakis and qualifier Dane Sweeny having won their openers on Wednesday, while Alex de Minaur will open his campaign, having been given a first-round bye, against Hungary’s Fabian Marozsan on Friday.
De Minaur will be playing at a career-high ranking of No.11, the highest by any Australian singles man for 17 years.
But of the 11 Aussies who started in the main draw, four more got knocked out on Thursday.
Alexei Popyrin went out to Matteo Arnald 4-6 6-3 6-4, while French qualifier Terence Atmane beat Jordan Thompson 6-3 3-6 6-1, Dutchman Botic van de Zandschulp defeated Chris O’Connell 6-2 6-7 (2-7) 6-4 and Philip Sekulic’s latest promising run through qualifying was ended by Italian Lorenzo Sonego 6-3 6-2.
Stefano Napolitano, who made the main draw after his Australian qualifying opponent Marc Polmans was defaulted for hitting the ball into the face of the chair umpire, lost to qualifier Beibit Zhukayev 7-5 7-5.
Frenchman Gregoire Barrere beat Nonu Borges 6-2 6-2 in his first round match to set up a date with top seed Carlos Alcaraz as the big names prepare to enter the tournament.
