Arnaldi Qualifies For Wimbledon Debut

After qualifying at Roland Garros and picking up a win in his major main-draw debut, Italy’s Matteo Arnaldi has once again come through the qualifying draw at Wimbledon. On Thursday, the 22-year-old secured his first appearance at the All England Lawn Tennis Club with a 7-5, 6-4, 6-4 victory against Frederico Ferreira Silva.

As the top seed in qualifying, Arnaldi lost the opening set of his campaign against Shang Juncheng, but then won seven sets in a row. 

The Italian competed in the Next Gen ATP Finals in Milan last season and finished 2022 at No. 134 in the Pepperstone ATP Rankings. He since reached a career-high of World No. 72 after winning his fourth ATP Challenger Tour title earlier this month in Heilbronn, Germany.

Three other Top 10 qualifying seeds also booked their places in the main draw with Thursday wins. Fifth seed Radu Albot was a 4-6, 6-3, 6-2, 7-6(6) winner against Felipe Meligeni Alves, sixth seed Tomas Machac advanced past Lucas Pouille via a second-set retirement, and 10th seed Dominic Stricker beat Mattia Bellucci 6-3, 1-6, 6-3, 6-4. Stricker also competed at the Next Gen ATP Finals in 2022, reaching the semi-finals.

No other seeded players were among the 16 to advance to the Wimbledon main draw.

Four five-setters were contested on Thursday, with Wimbledon switching to the familiar best-of-five format for the final round of qualifying. A seeded player was upset in all four such matches.

Third seed Fabian Marozsan, who made headlines with an upset of Carlos Alcaraz in Rome last month, was beaten by Maximilian Marterer, with the German claiming a 7-5, 6-4, 6-7(5), 5-7, 7-5 result. Belgium’s Kimmer Coppejans upset fourth seed Taro Daniel 6-3, 4-6, 4-6, 6-4, 6-2; France’s Laurent Lokoli outlasted 13th seed Michael Mmoh 2-6, 7-6(2), 6-3, 2-6, 6-2; and Chile’s Tomas Barrios Vera downed 21st seed Thiago Seyboth Wild 6-4, 6-7(3), 2-6, 6-3, 6-2.

Sho Shimabukuro, Oscar Otte, Dennis Novak, Gijs Brouwer, Enzo Couacaud, Hamad Medjedovic, Harold Mayot and Shintaro Mochizuki also qualified for the main draw with Thursday wins.

The advancing players will find out their opening main-draw opponents during Friday’s draw, which is set for 10 a.m. local time.