Michelsen upsets Tsitsipas at Australian Open

Alex Michelsen has produced the first big upset of the 2025 Australian Open, defeating 2023 finalist Stefanos Tsitsipas 7-5, 6-3, 2-6, 6-4 Monday to charge into the second round.

Playing bold, confident, imaginative tennis, Michelsen kept the Greek on the backfoot with a string of fierce winners from both wings. He took big forehand cuts on Tsitsipas' first serve and left the 26-year-old floundering at key moments with running down-the-line backhand strikes.

The victory did not come without drama, however. The 20-year-old American threw in three double faults midway through the fourth set to hand back two service breaks. But ultimately it was a Tsitsipas double fault on break point at 5-all that proved decisive.

“Probably the only other time I have played that well was against De Minaur in Cabos last year,” Michelsen told ATPTour.com. “I went in there and I never hit the ball cleaner in my whole life. I don’t think I played outrageously well like I did against De Minaur, but I did play very well.

“I had a set game plan and I knew what I wanted to do. The plan was specific to Stef, but when you play that well, playing that aggressively, you think to yourself that I might try this more often. I feel if I'm playing like that, it would definitely work against a lot of the guys.”

The victory marks Michelsen's first Top 20 win at a major and sees him move to a career-high No. 41 in the PIF ATP Live Rankings. He improves to 2-0 in his Lexus ATP Head2Head series with Tsitsipas, having beaten the 12-time ATP Tour titlist and 2019 Nitto ATP Finals champion in Tokyo last year. 

Michelsen, who clubbed 46 winners, including eight aces, according to Infosys ATP Stats, next faces the winner of Spanish qualifier and Jeddah alternate Martin Landaluce and Australian wild card James McCabe.

Tsitsipas, who also reached the Australian Open semi-finals in 2019, 2021 and 2022, had reached the second week in Melbourne in five of the past six years. He has not made it beyond the second round of his past three majors, having fallen in the second round at Wimbledon and the first round of the US Open last year.