British qualifier Harriet Dart wants to draw on last year’s chastening Australian Open experience when she meets two-time Grand Slam champion Simona Halep on Thursday.

Dart, 23, plays the fourth seed on Rod Laver Arena – where she lost 6-0 6-0 to Maria Sharapova in 2019.

“It is a great opportunity to see where my level is,” Dart, ranked 173, said.

Dart and Heather Watson, who plays 16th seed Elise Mertens, are the last British players left in the singles.

The match between Dart and Romanian Halep opens the night session on the 15,000-capacity arena at 08:00 GMT.

You can follow Dart’s progress on BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra’s Tennis Breakfast and through the BBC Sport website’s live text service.

Watson had to wait until Wednesday to play her opening match, beating Czech Kristyna Pliskova 4-6 6-3 6-1 in blustery conditions. Her second-round match is second on court 22 at about 02:00 GMT.

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Dart moved into the second round this year with a gutsy three-set win over Japan’s Misaki Doi, going some way to putting that heavy defeat by five-time Grand Slam champion Sharapova behind her.

She was also beaten 6-1 6-1 by Australia’s world number one Ashleigh Barty on Centre Court at Wimbledon last July.

“They were both completely different occasions on big courts against big players,” Dart told BBC Sport.

“I think I have kept learning from all the experiences I’ve had over the past year and hopefully I can draw on them and bring that to the match against Halep.

“She’s one of the players I particularly look up to. Her athletic ability is pretty incredible and she’s a Grand Slam champion for a reason.”

British number two Watson, 27, will meet Mertens for the second time in a week after winning their Hobart quarter-final last Thursday.

Another success for the Guernsey player would see her reach the Australian Open third round for the first time since 2013.

“Beating her last week will give me confidence to know I can beat her, especially if it gets close,” Watson said.

“I stayed calm last week and stayed there every point. That’s what you need to do against a player like her who is very solid.”

Meanwhile, 14th seeds Jamie Murray and Neal Skupski begin their men’s doubles campaign on court 14, while Joe Salisbury and Cameron Norrie are among other Britons in doubles action.

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British number one Dan Evans says he would prefer to miss the Tokyo 2020 Olympics and concentrate on the hard court season in the the United States.

The 29-year-old, who is at a career-high world ranking of 32, insists his stance is not a lack of enthusiasm for representing Great Britain.

“I think everyone should represent their country for the Davis Cup, Fed Cup and ATP Cup but the Olympics is sort of an individual event,” he said.

“I’m not sure I’ll be going to Japan.”

The Olympics run from 24 July to 9 August and the tennis event, which has 64 players in singles, does not carry prize money or ranking points.

The US hard court season is made up of several events running from late July to the US Open which starts with qualifying from 24 August.

“First and foremost I have to take care of myself and my life rather than maybe taking time out – there’s some good tournaments on at that point,” he added.

“I probably won’t do it because of certain situations. I don’t have long to play as well so I probably won’t go over to Japan.”

Evans declined a place in Britain’s team for Rio 2016 after being offered a role following a spate of injury withdrawals.

He was beaten 6-4 6-3 6-4 by Japan’s Yoshihito Nishioka in his second-round match at the Australian Open on Wednesday.

Kiki Bertens, the Dutch world number 10, is the latest WTA Tour star to feature in a BBC Sport column. In her second piece from the Australian Open, the 2016 French Open semi-finalist talks about the impending comeback of her idol Kim Clijsters, why she is never satisfied after a match and how she tries not to talk tennis with her husband at the dinner table.

Even though I never really liked watching tennis too much when I was growing up, it is fair to say Kim Clijsters was my idol.

Kim was a great player, a great person and a great champion. Plus she is from Belgium, really close to where I am from, so it is pretty obvious why I liked her.

That meant I was really happy to see her announce a comeback at the age of 36 after more than seven years away from the WTA Tour.

It came as a complete surprise to me. I never saw it coming. But now I’m thinking it would be great if I could play her one day.

I don’t know how I would feel if that was to happen, but of course I would want to beat her! That’s the case with every player.

Her game was very good to watch; she was really aggressive and her movement was good.

We will have to see how successful her comeback is going to be. Maybe it won’t be that easy.

Maria Sharapova and Victoria Azarenka are examples of other former Grand Slam winners who have tried to come back after a long time away.

It is not as easy as it was before – I think the level is so high and everyone can play really well.

It will be tough for Kim and I have no idea how she is shaping up now.

But she was a great athlete in her prime and you can’t rule anything out. So let’s see what happens.

‘I need to play more aggressively’

I started the Australian Open with a 6-1 6-4 win against Romania’s Irina-Camelia Begu on Tuesday – but, despite the scoreline, I was not completely happy.

Of course I am happy with the result, but I am never really satisfied with how I play. There is always something that I want to do better.

I think winning by that scoreline and not being completely satisfied is a good sign. And it is a sign of how far I have come over the past few years – and that I still want more.

My confidence has grown so much in the past few years that even when I’m not playing my best, I still feel calm on court and find a way to win.

Against Begu, I was not playing really aggressively, apart from my serve, which I used really well.

The rest of my game was more about moving a lot from side to side, making as many balls as I could and just putting it back in the court.

For the next match, and if I want to go deeper in the tournament, I will have to play more aggressively.

‘Playing a new opponent requires some homework’

On Thursday, I will play Arina Rodionova in the second round – she is an Australian wildcard who I’ve never faced before.

That is going to be a tough one, like all matches are at a Grand Slam. She had a good first-round win, losing the opening set to Ukraine’s Kateryna Bondarenko before turning the match around.

Arina is from Melbourne so I’m sure she will have the crowd behind her, but that does not faze me.

It is really exciting when I play someone I have never played before. My coach Elise Tamaela went to watch her match to find out how she is playing.

Normally I rely on Elise going to a match and listening to what she tells me about an opponent, as well as drawing on my own experiences.

But if I’ve never played a girl before, then I will also watch videos of her play on the internet. That’s my homework.

I will watch it and see what she did well but I think it is more important to concentrate on my own strengths.

‘How my husband and I juggle tennis and marriage’

As I told you in my first column, I got married in the summer to my husband Remko, who is part of my team.

He is a physio and a fitness trainer, but a coach as well, and my coach Elise is also a fitness trainer and physio. So they can do both – and if I’m not happy with one, then I can switch to the other!

It is great he is part of our team because otherwise we’d have no time to see each other.

Remko has his own tennis academy in Belgium so he travels with us for half of the year.

I think it is good that he travels with us only half of the time, and not full time, because I think that would make it a little bit tougher.

We manage to balance our work and private life very well; we have found a good way to do that.

Most of the time when we are on site at a tournament it is work, and that really starts when he is doing my warm-up before practice.

At the end of the day, when we have finished stretching and the rest of my recovery routine, he becomes my husband again and the work stops.

Then we can do normal stuff as husband and wife, go for a nice dinner, watch a movie or just relax.

When we are having dinner in a restaurant, we try not to talk about tennis – but sometimes it is hard.

Does whoever bring up to tennis first at the dinner table have to pay the bill? Not at the moment. But that’s a good idea, maybe we will start doing that!

Kiki Bertens was speaking to BBC Sport’s Jonathan Jurejko at Melbourne Park

Britain’s Heather Watson showed tremendous fight to reach the Australian Open second round before Dan Evans missed out on the chance of a potential meeting with Novak Djokovic.

Watson, ranked 75th, won 4-6 6-3 6-1 in blustery conditions against Czech Kristyna Pliskova.

British number one Evans, seeded 30th, lost 6-4 6-3 6-4 to Japan’s Yoshihito Nishioka in his second-round match.

Watson and Harriet Dart are the only remaining Britons in the singles draws.

Watson will meet Belgian 16th seed Elise Mertens for the second time in a week after winning their Hobart International quarter-final last Thursday.

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Watson weathers the wind to win

After beating Pliskova, Watson said having played in similar conditions in Hobart last week – and growing up in windy Guernsey – had stood her in good stead.

“It was super windy today but I felt prepared because it was like that in Hobart a lot of the days,” the 27-year-old said.

“But being a first-round match and being postponed I felt a bit nervous in that first set and a bit tense.

“I managed to loosen up, relax and enjoy the match.”

Mertens beat Montenegro’s Danka Kovinic later on Wednesday as, like Watson, she had to come back a day later as a consequence of the backlog of matches caused by Monday’s rain washout.

Watson has not enjoyed many victories in the Grand Slams recently, showing her pleasure at digging in and beating 65th-ranked Pliskova with a wide smile and tight clenched fist towards her box.

The Briton had won only one match in her last six appearances in the main draw in Melbourne but had come here in good form after her Hobart performances.

In difficult conditions in which both players struggled at times with their ball toss, Watson eventually dealt with them better as Pliskova – twin sister of second seed Karolina – began to show her frustration.

Watson’s service game improved as the match wore on and she continued to hit a steady stream of winners to to clinch an impressive victory.

“I don’t mind the wind and with the way I play – a lot of slice, drops shots, change-of-pace balls – I think it works well. And I’m patient,” she said.

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Out-of-sorts Evans ends British hopes in the men’s singles

British number one Evans needed to fight back from two sets down in his opening match against American Mackenzie McDonald, but there was no sign of another memorable comeback against an inspired Nishioka.

Evans, 29, said he did not “feel good at all” going into Monday’s match, possibly the effects of his heroics for Great Britain at the ATP Cup and playing in Adelaide last week.

Two days later he again looked out-of-sorts and this time he was unable to put any pressure on his opponent.

“I’ve not had the ranking to skip weeks, but maybe in hindsight I could not have played last week,” Evans said.

“It’s been a long few weeks since pre-season. I’ve been away a long time and I didn’t feel great.”

Evans, who was competing in his first Grand Slam as a seeded player, could not force a single break point as 71st-ranked Nishioka eased into a two-set lead.

The Briton looked to be struggling physically as he sat in his chair at the end of the second set, although he recovered to push Nishioka, who made only two unforced errors in the previous set, closer in the third.

However, he was broken in his penultimate service game as a tie-break loomed, unable to land a first serve before hitting a forehand wide of the line on Nishioka’s first match point.

The 24-year-old Japanese fell to his knees on the court and looked up to the sky in celebration as contemplated his achievement of reaching the third round of a Grand Slam for the first time.

His reward is a meeting with Serbian defending champion Djokovic, who beat Nishioka’s compatriot Tatsuma Ito 6-1 6-4 6-2.

Evans was the third and final Briton to fall in the men’s singles after Kyle Edmund and Cameron Norrie lost their opening matches on Tuesday.

Analysis

BBC tennis correspondent Russell Fuller

Dan Evans was the first to admit that Yoshihito Nishioka handled the windy conditions better than he did.

But having confessed to feeling sore in his first-round victory over Mackenzie McDonald, it’s clear Evans’ success at the ATP Cup and in Adelaide earlier this month did come at a price.

As he said – in typical Evans style – he was at a bit of a loose end last week, and so couldn’t resist a trip to Adelaide, where he reached the quarter-finals.

The upside was a 10-place rise in the rankings and an extra $250 000 (£192,000) in the bank.

Evans says he has no regrets, but hinted he will make a few changes to his schedule so he can arrive at the big events feeling fresher in future.

British interest as doubles begins

The men’s doubles got under way on day three with two British players involved.

Jonny O’Mara progressed to the second round alongside partner Marcelo Arevalo, from El Salvador, with a 6-3 6-2 win over Bolivian Hugo Dellien and Argentine Juan Ignacio Londero.

However, Dom Inglot and Saudi Arabia’s Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi were knocked out in the opening round, losing in three sets to Jean-Julien Rojer and Horia Tecau.

The eighth seeded Dutch-Romanian pair won 6-1 3-6 6-2.

Jamie Murray and Neal Skupski begin their campaign against Canadian Vasek Pospisil and Poland’s Hubert Hurkacz on Thursday.

Defending champion Naomi Osaka moved into the last 32 at the Australian Open with a straight-sets win over China’s Saisai Zheng.

The Japanese third seed took one hour 20 minutes to see off the world number 42 6-2 6-4 on Margaret Court Arena.

Osaka, 22, now faces a potential third-round meeting with US teenager Coco Gauff, who plays Sorana Cirstea later.

American 14th seed Sofia Kenin also progressed against compatriot Ann Li, beating the wildcard 6-1 6-3.

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