Australian Open Qualifiers: Yuki Bhambri goes down, no Indian in singles main draw

Indian tennis player Yuki Bhambri suffered a straight sets defeat to Czech Republic's Tomas Machac in the Australian Open qualifiers in Melbourne on Thursday, meaning the year's first Grand Slam will have no Indian participation in the singles main draw.

Bhambri lost his second round qualifying match 1-6 3-6. Machac has a career high ATP singles ranking of 131 achieved on November 8 2021. He also has a career high doubles ranking of 470 achieved on November 1 2021.

On Tuesday, comeback man Bhambri had impressed with his attacking net play in a straight sets win but Ramkumar Ramanathan's 23rd attempt at cracking the singles main draw of a grand slam had ended in a first round defeat at the Australian Open qualifiers. In the women's singles, Ankita Raina, ranked 203, was blown away by 120th ranked Ukrainian Lesia Tsurenko 6-1, 6-0 in just 50 minutes.