Demon cops draw from hell; gifts for ex-champ, dark horse — Aus Open draw winners and losers

The 2026 Australian Open draw is out – and with it, some clear winners and losers.

So who could make a surprising run at Melbourne Park and how did the Aussies fare?

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Foxsports.com.au breaks down the winners and losers from the draw.

WINNERS

Aussie women not named Maya Joint

There’s every chance we see a few local women through to the second round, at least, with four of them landing qualifiers as their first-up opponents.

That includes Daria Kasatkina, playing her first Australian Open as an Aussie after switching from Russia. She made the fourth round at Melbourne Park last year but fell out of the top 30 due to some inactivity and a few poor results.

Kim Birrell and Ajla Tomljanovic will also have high hopes against qualifiers.

Emerson Jones cops a fellow teenager first-up, but 19-year-old Victoria Mboko looks a star of the future, having won the Canadian Open last year in stunning fashion.

Mboko is the No.17 seed but has never won a match at a hard-court slam, showing just how meteoric her rise has been.

Aryna Sabalenka… mostly

We’ll flag two potential stumbling blocks for the two-time champion in an otherwise manageable draw.

Sabalenka could face her 2025 quarter-final opponent Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in the second round this year, when the Russian took a set off the then-reigning champ.

Then at the business end is a potential mouth-watering semi-final against Coco Gauff, who has beaten her twice in slam finals. Notably last year’s French Open caused plenty of drama and could bring back some bad memories.

But most of the true seeded threats to Sabalenka winning a third crown are on the other side of the draw – the in-form Belinda Bencic, former finalist Elena Rybakina, defending champ Madison Keys and Naomi Osaka among them.

There’s also the contrast with Iga Swiatek, the world No.2 who could cop Anna Kalinskaya in the third round (who probably should’ve beaten her at the US Open last year), then Osaka in the fourth round and Rybakina in the quarter-finals.

Sabalenka’s comparable projected path is Emma Raducanu in the third round, Clara Tauson in the fourth and Jasmine Paolini in the quarters. It’s much less threatening.

Daniil Medvedev

The three-time Australian Open finalist believes he’s playing at a top-five level right now. If he’s right, he has a golden opportunity to make the semi-finals.

The No.11 seed, who just won the Brisbane International, will be warmly favoured until the fourth round where No.7 Felix Auger-Aliassime could loom – a tricky match no doubt, but entirely winnable.

Medvedev is 7-2 against the Canadian including two meetings in Melbourne (2024 round of 32 and 2022 quarters) though he has dropped the last two.

Follow that with the easiest possible quarter-final draw with No.3 seed Alex Zverev, and it would not be shocking at all to see Medvedev in the semis against Carlos Alcaraz this year.

LOSERS

Alex de Minaur

There are two parts to this; let’s start with the start.

Matteo Berrettini was one of the most dangerous possible first-round opponents in the draw. Admittedly hasn’t done much since 2022, when he made the Australian Open semi-finals and US Open quarter-finals – and throw in the 2021 Wimbledon final for good measure. But injuries are a big reason for that and the Italian now appears to be healthy.

In fact, Berrettini beat de Minaur in the round of 16 in Miami last March, though de Minaur got revenge in Vienna in October.

He’s a top-30 player according to the Tennis Abstract Elo ratings and while de Minaur should get the job done – he has never lost to a lower-ranked player at Melbourne Park – it’s a threat he didn’t need.

Frances Tiafoe in the third round isn’t ideal either, the American being a two-time semi-finalist at the US Open, showing his abilities on hard courts. Then in the fourth round is a possible date with Alexander Bublik, the freshly-minted world No.10 who beat de Minaur in the second round at Roland Garros last year.

And then we can talk about a quarter-final against world No.1 Carlos Alcaraz… which, weirdly, isn’t a terrible result.

Hear us out. Alcaraz is obviously likely to beat de Minaur but he’s a much more high-variance player than Jannik Sinner, who absolutely destroys the Aussie every time they meet.

There’s a greater chance Alcaraz combusts before the quarter-finals, or in the quarter-finals, than Sinner doing so.

And if de Minaur can get through that round he’s likely got Alex Zverev in the semi-finals – which would be winnable.

So there’s a path here to glory, but it’s trickier than it needed to be, especially the opener.

Most of the other Aussie men, too

Obviously Adam Walton copped it the toughest drawing world No.1 Carlos Alcaraz in his opening match, though that should at least mean some nice centre court time.

Without the protection of a seed this year, Alexei Popyrin lands the man one spot below him in the ATP rankings Alexandre Muller, before a likely second-round date with world No.3 Alex Zverev. Not ideal.

Tristan Schoolkate also opens with a seed (No.32 Corentin Moutet) though at the same time, that’s the lowest possible seed he could have drawn within the first two rounds. And it could’ve certainly been worse for some of his compatriots.

Aleks Vukic has a reasonable shot at a second-round clash with No.19 seed Tommy Paul, opening against world No.103 Thiago Agustín Tirante.

Jordan Thompson (vs Juan Manuel Cerundolo) and Rinky Hijikata (vs veteran Adrian Mannarino) won’t hate their chances of an upset while James Duckworth and Christopher O’Connell both open with a qualifier or lucky loser.

Maya Joint

It’s a manageable draw for the Aussie women’s No.1 but fellow teenager Tereza Valentova will pose a real threat in her opening match.

Joint has set a goal this year to make a career-best grand slam third round; thus far the 19-year-old has made the second round of the US Open twice.

Beating Valentova is no fait accompli. After dominating at lower levels for a period, the Czech made impressive deep runs at two hard court tournaments in 2025 – to the semi-finals at home in Prague, and to the finals in Osaka.

She performed admirably in her second-round US Open loss against Elena Rybakina, and in Brisbane fell 6-4 6-4 to former world No.11 Anna Kalinskaya. She is now ranked 59th in the world but the Tennis Abstract Elo ratings have her inside the top 20 on hard courts.

Joint will still be favoured to make the third round where she would be unlikely to beat world No.5 and former finalist Elena Rybakina, though Rybakina is volatile.

EARLY UPSET WATCH

World No.3 Alex Zverev won’t love drawing Canada’s Gabriel Diallo in his opener – Diallo was seeded as recently as the US Open.

No.8 seed Ben Shelton got unlucky too with Ugo Humbert, the No.14 seed and a fourth-rounder last year, in his opening match and another Frenchman Gael Monfils potentially awaiting in Round 2.

And while we’d hesitate to suggest he will lose, Jannik Sinner vs No.28 seed Joao Fonseca in the third round could be a preview of future slam finals.

No.23 seed Diana Shnaider copped the toughest first-round draw for any seed, opening with 2024 Wimbledon champ Barbora Krejcikova. The latter is arguably the favourite.

Finally while it’s more a fun alert than an upset alert, Coco Gauff vs Venus Williams in the second round could be a generational battle of greats.