Australian Open 2025 Day 2 Summary

Day 2 in Melbourne is complete, resulting in Jannik Sinner, Carlos Alcaraz and Novak Djokovic advancing to round two.

While all three were tested, Djokovic had the toughest ride, dropping the opening set in his match against wildcard Nishesh Basavareddy before using his physicality to push through 4-6 6-3, 6-4 6-2.

Speaking of physicality, there were also two mid-match retirements as Jerry Shang threw in the towel against Davidovich Fokina and, more notably, 10th seed Grigor Dimitrov wrapped up when he was down 5-7 1-2 to the lucky loser Francesco Passaro, who had replaced Fabio Foginin in the last hour.

The Bulgarian also retired in Brisbane with the same groin problem. He has now retired from his last three Grand Slam matches and has done so eight times in 57 slam appearances – not a great record.

There were only two notable losers: Tsitsipas crashed out against Michelsen, and one of last year’s form players, Alejandro Tabilo, came away with Roberto Carballes’ Baena.

In the end, Tommy Paul avoided being added to the list above, as he had to go through a four-hour fight against Christopher O’Connell. The 12th seed served out the match at 5-4 in the fourth but had to dig in before taking the decider 7-5.

Full results and selected highlights from today’s play are below.

Day Two 2025 Australian Open Round of 128 Results

Winner	Loser	Score line
Jannik Sinner (1)	Nicolas Jarry	7-6(2) 7-6(5) 6-1
Tristan Schoolkate (WC)	Taro Daniel	6-7(6) 7-6(4) 6-1 6-4
Alex Michelsen	Stefanos Tsitsipas (11)	7-5 6-3 2-6 6-4
James McCabe (WC)	Martin Landaluce (Q)	6-4 6-3 6-4
Fabian Marozsan	Thiago Seyboth-Wild	6-3 6-7(7) 7-5 5-7 7-5
Frances Tiafoe (17)	Arthur Rinderknecht	7-6(2) 6-3 4-6 6-7(4) 6-3
Novak Djokovic (7)	Nishesh Basavareddy (WC)	4-6 6-3 6-4 6-2
Jaime Faria (Q)	Pavel Kotov	6-1 6-1 7-5
Benjamin Bonzi	David Goffin	6-1 6-2 7-6(7)
Francesco Passaro (LL)	Grigor Dimitrov (10)	7-5 2-1 (RET)
Jack Draper (15)	Mario Navone	4-6 6-3 3-6 6-3 6-2
Thanasi Kokkinakis	Roman Safiullin	3-6 6-3 6-3 7-6(5)
Aleksandar Vukic	Damir Dzhumur	6-7(3) 6-0 3-6 6-3 6-4
Sebastian Korda (22)	Lukas Klein (Q)	6-3 0-6 6-3 7-6(6)
Jordan Thompson (27)	Dominik Koepfer (Q)	7-6(3) 6-4 4-6 6-3
Nuno Borges	Alexandre Muller	6-7(2) 6-3 6-2 7-5
Yoshihito Nishioka	Aziz Dougaz (Q)	3-6 6-4 7-6(3) 6-3
Carlos Alcaraz (3)	Alexander Shevchenko	6-1 7-5 6-1
Jakub Mensik	Nikoloz Basilashvili (Q)	6-1 6-7(3) 6-3 6-3
Alejandro Davidovich Fokina	Jerry Shang	7-6(1) 5-2 (COURT)
Felix Auger-Aliassime (29)	Jan Lennard Struff	6-3 6-0 4-6 6-1
Roberto Carballes Baena	Alejandro Tabilo (23)	1-6 6-2 6-3 7-6(1)
James Duckworth	Dominic Stricker	6-2 6-4 6-2
Tommy Paul (12)	Christopher O’Connell	6-2 3-6 6-1 6-7(5) 7-5

Sinner survives tough test

Jannik Sinner began his title defense with a hard-fought win over Nicolas Jarry in Monday’s first round of the Australian Open.

After a tough battle in the opening two sets, Sinner eventually pulled away for a 7-6(2), 7-6(5), 6-1 victory at Rod Laver Arena.

Jarry had a poor second half of the season after making the Masters 1000 final in Rome, but with strong support from the pro-Chilean crowd, he went through the first two sets without dropping serve or even facing a break point.

However, Sinner is rock solid from the baseline, and he took the first set in a tie-break and held firm in the second set tie-break, saving two set points on serve before closing it out.

With a comfortable lead, Sinner quickly asserted herself in the third set, breaking early for a 2-0 lead and cruising to victory. He will next face Aussie wild card Tristan Schoolkate, who was victorious over Taro Daniel.

I think it was very close today because the first sets can go either way. In the third set, when I broke him the first time, it gave me some room to breathe. He’s an incredible player, huge potential, so I’m happy with how I handled the very tough situation in the first sets and happy to be in the next round. The crowd and the fans, they give me so much support and it’s very nice to be back here. Obviously I also like the hard courts here. But let’s see, every year is different, every day is different… We’ll try to improve of course, I have a couple of things that I can do better for sure, but the first official game of the year for me, so I’m very happy. Sensing his opening win.

Michelsen tops Tsitsipas

Alex Michelsen completed the first major upset of the 2025 Australian Open on Monday, defeating 2023 finalist Stefanos Tsitsipas 7-5, 3-6, 6-2, 6-4.

As I noted in my draw preview post, Tsitsipas had a poor 2023, by his standards, and looked in equally poor form in the United Cup.

Michelsen is on the rise and played aggressive tennis, keeping Tsitsipas on the back foot with powerful winners from both sides.

This marks Michelsen’s first top 20 win in a major and propels him to a career-high No. 41 in the ATP rankings.

Tsitsipas has reached the Australian Open semi-finals several times, making it to Melbourne’s second week in five of the last six years.

However, he has failed to get past the second round in his last three majors, falling in the second round at Wimbledon and the first round at the US Open last year.

He said in the press that he is a better player than a few years ago, but the standard is much higher now, so his results are poor.

I think he lives in the cloud cuckoo if he thinks it is so; when he arrived on the scene, he looked like a multi-slam winner if he improved in a few areas, but he hasn’t gotten much better than his peers.

Look at Alcaraz for example; he’s making month-on-month improvements, arriving in Melbourne with a slightly tweaked serve and some racquet spec changes.

What improvements have you seen Tstisipas make in recent years? Ok, he tested exact position on the serve during a tournament or two. Anything else? Off the clay, there is too large a crop of players to take advantage of his game.

Alcaraz jumps past Shevchenko

Carlos Alcaraz began his 2025 Australian Open campaign with a confident 6-1, 7-5, 6-1 victory over Alexander Shevchenko.

The 21-year-old arrived in Melbourne with a slightly tweaked service movement and made a strong start, taking a 6-1 lead.

A brief dip in the second set saw him fall 3-5 down, but he reeled off four straight games to stave off all danger. In the third, he was big and in charge, easily moving the Ukrainian around the court to close out the match. Alcaraz will next face Yoshihito Nishioka.

Djokovic denies Basavareddy

Novak Djokovic kicked off his campaign under coach Andy Murray with a 4-6, 6-3, 6-4, 6-2 victory over American wildcard Nishesh Basavareddy.

Basavareddy made a strong start in Auckland last week and took full advantage of a weak start from the 10-time champion.

Basavareddy, who entered the main draw as a wildcard, looked unfazed by the big stage inside Rod Laver Arena as he outplayed Djokovic in the opener and saved three break points in the first set.

However, the physical toll of going toe-to-toe with the Serb began to show, and he called for a medical time-out after losing the second set.

From there, Djoker muscled his way to gain the upper hand, and while the second set was still not his best, by the third he had found more rhythm to propel himself into Round 2.

He was the better player for a set and a half, he deserved every bit of applause he got. It was a fantastic performance. These types of match-ups are always tricky [and] dangerous. He has nothing to lose in his first match at a Grand Slam. He pleasantly surprised me with all his shots until the end, so I wish him all the best in the future. It’s business now for us, I’m happy to have him in my corner. It was a bit of a strange experience to have him on the court in my box… We played against each other for over 20 years, and it’s great to have him on the same side of the net. He gave me some good advice in the middle of the match. It’s really good that we have the opportunity to exchange some feedback and have our coaches tell us what they see. It has been a fantastic experience [with Murray]hopefully we don’t stop here. Djokovic on his win.

Other notable matches

In other action, 15th seed Jack Draper came back to defeat Mariano Navone 4-6, 6-3, 3-6, 6-3, 6-2 in a four-hour thriller.

It’s a surprise because Navone isn’t a strong hardcourt player, but you feel Draper will always struggle in five-setters.

He will next face Thanasi Kokkinakis, who defeated Roman Safiullin 3-6, 6-3, 6-3, 7-6(5). Both guys aren’t known for their ability to play back-to-back five-setters, so I think Draper will probably come through.

American Sebastian Korda also advanced with a 6-3, 0-6, 6-3, 7-6(6) win over Lukas Klein and will next face Aleksandar Vukic.

While it was a good day overall for the Aussies as Kokkinaksi, Thompson, Vukic, McCabe, Schoolkate and Duckworth all won, Nick Kyrgios was stunned by Jacob Fearnley, who lost 6-7(3), 3-6, 6-7( 2) )

The 23-year-old Briton ranked number 92 was making his first appearance in Melbourne, and he showed impressive composure, hitting 17 aces and winning 81% of the points on his first serve.

Kyrgios, who I thought played well against Mpetshi Perricard in Brisbane, struggled with an abdominal injury and called for physio twice in the second set, so his comeback is already looking derailed.

Australian Open Day 3 round of 128 matches