Alex de Minaur waltzed through the All England club gates last year with a pep in his step after a surprise quarter-final run at Roland-Garros.
Twelve months later, Australia’s best tennis player returns to the scene of his dramatic Wimbledon quarter-final appearance riddled with doubts and searching for answers.
De Minaur has candidly shared his mental and physical weariness across the past month, and his scheduling decisions and recent results – including a second-round exit in Paris – illuminated those words.
His confession about not enjoying a hitting session on grass with fiancee Katie Boulter after his Roland-Garros flop was another reason for concern, and even took him by surprise.
“I was like, ‘I can’t remember the last time I haven’t enjoyed having a hit on the grass’,” said de Minaur, who is on a round of 16 collision course with Novak Djokovic.
De Minaur’s response to that unfamiliar feeling was to take a few more days off, in the hope that would re-energise him for what is typically one of the most productive swings of his season.
Australians at Wimbledon in 2025
Table with 4 columns and 10 rows.
Ranking Men Ranking Women
11 Alex de Minaur 16 Daria Kasatkina
22 Alexei Popyrin 51 Maya Joint
45 Jordan Thompson 77 Kimberly Birrell
79 Christopher O’Connell 80 Alja Tomljanoivc
80 Aleksander Vukic 102 Olivia Gadecki
86 Adam Walton 129 Talia Gibson (Q)
88 Rinky Hijikata 137 Priscilla Hon (Q)
106 James Duckworth
177 James McCabe (Q)
181 Alex Bolt (Q)
That optimism was dulled when he suffered a comprehensive straight-sets defeat to powerful Czech Jiri Lehecka at Queen’s Club last week.
The Lehecka result means de Minaur’s calculated risk of prioritising more rest and training time over defending his ’s-Hertogenbosch title leaves him with just one competitive grasscourt match under his belt.
Another revealing insight into de Minaur’s mindset followed when he was asked after the Lehecka loss if he was mentally and physically OK.
“Yeah, that’s a good question. I’m not too sure,” he said.
“[This] obviously wasn’t the kind of result I was hoping for, coming here to Queen’s. Skipping the first week [was] so that I would give myself time and be able to hopefully have a good result here and be happy with that decision. But obviously, it wasn’t a good day today.
“So, back to the drawing board, and we’re going to have to make some decisions.”
De Minaur’s decision not to compete in ’s-Hertogenbosch in the Netherlands cost him his top-10 ranking, and he will be the No.11 seed at Wimbledon. He rose to a career-high No.6 after his quarter-final run in London last year.
De Minaur will face a higher-ranked opponent in the round of 16 if the seedings hold, but he believes he made the right call to briefly step away.
“The way I looked at it – and what is healthy for me – is to stop obsessing about rankings, and whether I go up or go down every week,” he said.
“[I want to] try to go back to a place where I’m just enjoying playing tennis and not thinking about all those outside factors because it just gives added stress.
“I’ve got to start having a little bit more of a mentality of a big player and start backing myself to not have to play so many tournaments, and to hopefully do well in the big events.
“Mentally, I do feel I’m in the right spot, and even if it doesn’t bring results this week, I’m confident that it will help me in the long run.”
De Minaur’s breakthrough Wimbledon performance last year will bring with it some anguished memories of their own.
He breezed through the first four rounds to make the last eight for the first time, but a freak hip injury sustained on the third-last point of his round-of-16 win over Arthur Fils stopped him from facing Novak Djokovic in the quarter-finals.
De Minaur put on a brave face after the Fils victory, but withdrew after barely being able to practise on the day he was due to take on Djokovic in what would have been the biggest match of his life.
He was never the same player for the remainder of last year after that setback, which cruelly interrupted a campaign that had him racing towards a potential top-five ranking.
Even so, a clearly hampered de Minaur still battled his way to the US Open quarter-finals and achieved the same feat for the first time at the Australian Open in January.
His Roland-Garros defeat to Alexander Bublik snapped his streak of grand slam quarter-finals at four, but he has mostly saved his best for the majors in the past 18 months. Meanwhile, Bublik made the last eight in Paris before winning last week’s Halle title, so that loss looks nowhere near as bad in hindsight.
It all adds up to a great unknown about de Minaur’s Wimbledon prospects. He may never have been considered a title contender, but is one of the world’s best grasscourters across several years.
He has made a career out of proving others wrong.
The difference now is his success in the next fortnight could be determined instead by whether he can beat the self-doubts his public comments suggest he is fighting.
Demon’s date with destiny
The match that never happened at Wimbledon last year could get a reboot in the fourth round 12 months later.
De Minaur, the figurehead of Australia’s largest main draw singles contingent, is on a collision course with seven-time champion Djokovic in the fourth round, a year after withdrawing on the day of their blockbuster quarter-final due to a hip injury.
The world No.11 is one of 17 Australians competing in singles thanks to Alex Bolt – for the second straight year – Priscilla Hon, Talia Gibson and James McCabe battling through qualifying.
Hon and Gibson both staved off match points to book their place at the All England club, which was extra special for the former, given it was her seventh attempt.
De Minaur will first need to negotiate Spanish veteran Roberto Carballes Baena, who has won only one match in six trips at the grasscourt major. Fellow Australian Adam Walton is a potential second-round opponent if he can overcome French qualifier Arthur Cazaux.
De Minaur’s projected third-round opponent is No.21 seed Tomas Machac, a talented Czech player.
Alexei Popyrin, the No.20 seed, also has a soft start on paper, up against 465th-ranked British wildcard Arthur Fery. Jordan Thompson landed in the same section and begins with Czech Vit Kopriva before a likely clash against ninth-seeded Russian Daniil Medvedev.
The toughest draw went to Bolt, who will need to beat American 10th seed and fellow big-serving left-hander Ben Shelton to make the second round for the first time since 2021.
Fellow qualifier McCabe drew Hungarian Fabian Marozsan, Aleks Vukic faces Taiwan’s Tseng Chun-hsin, Rinky Hijikata starts with Belgian David Goffin, and Chris O’Connell meets tricky Frenchman Adrian Mannarino, who made it through qualifying.
On the women’s side, 16th-seeded Daria Kasatkina’s first opponent in her second grand slam as an Australian is Colombian Emiliana Arango. However, three of her compatriots have tough starts against seeded rivals, including the in-form Maya Joint.
Joint, who will take on Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in the Eastbourne semi-finals as she bids to be Australia’s first finalist there in 32 years, will lock horns with 19th-seeded Russian Liudmila Samsonova at Wimbledon.
Hon and Kim Birrell meet No.18 seed Ekaterina Alexandrova and 22nd-seeded Croatian Donna Vekic, respectively, while qualifier Gibson will go head-to-head with four-time grand slam winner Naomi Osaka in her Wimbledon debut.
Elsewhere, Olivia Gadecki drew Belgium’s Greet Minnen, and dual Wimbledon quarter-finalist Ajla Tomljanovic has been pitted against Pavlyuchenkova in a difficult encounter for both players.