Alex de Minaur finds career-best form to defeat Alexander Bublik at 2026 Australian Open, now for a quarter-final against Carlos Alcaraz

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39 percent of De Minaur’s serves went unrewarded; This eclipsed the powerful Bublik’s own serve rate and he committed 10 unforced errors compared to the 19 players who won in an elite display.

He also sent more free serves than Tiafoe in the previous round. The serve is the part of Minaur’s arsenal that has been criticized more than any other, but it has been a weapon in this recent Melbourne Park run.

Bublik’s decline began in the 10th game of the opening set, when de Minaur wrestled against baseline combat.

A big part of this was that, after Bublik had done a good job of pushing the Australian star deeper up the pitch than he wanted, de Minaur was eventually damaging the Kazakh with quality deep returns that allowed him to control some points.

Facing a double break point, a double fault sealed Bublik’s fate in the first set, and from there the unraveling was as rapid as it was surprising.

World number 10 Bublik scored 81 percent of his first serves in the second set and 70 percent in the third set; Those odds would usually make him difficult to beat, but somehow he only won 18 of those points in that period, something he later lamented.

“The scoreboard shows how difficult it is [to play de Minaur] because I think I served well,” Bublik said.

“So I won by serving over 70 percent, especially in the second and third sets. [a low number of those] point. Unfortunately, everything was one-sided. This wasn’t what I wanted. “It’s not what I prepared for, but that’s tennis.”

Bublik audibly complained about the court speed during the shootout and doubled down post-match after playing on the faster Margaret Court Arena pitch for much of the tournament. However, he admitted that it was his fault that he could not adapt to the conditions.

Everywhere you looked, de Minaur covered the on-form Bublik. Those all-important 0-4 shooting rallies? De Minaur won these points 57-35 and was on top when the exchanges were extended.

Bublik’s impatience, like Tiafoe before him, cost him multiple times as he regularly struggled to find a path towards de Minaur and attempted to hit bigger and more aggressively, often resulting in him misfiring.

He had barely more wins than De Minaur, but made more than three times as many unforced errors. This was a recipe for disaster.

Down two sets, the only hope for Bublik was whether de Minaur, who fell from the same position in Paris last year, still had the mental scars left. But this is a new and improved de Minaur, who took a 4-0 lead in the third set before reaching the finish line.

Alcaraz, who missed out only on the Australian Open title to complete his grand slam collection, did not lose a set at Melbourne Park as he reached his third quarter-final in the country.

He has never progressed beyond this stage in the Open, but has a 5-0 head-to-head record with de Minaur, although each of the matches have been competitive. This is their first match at a major.

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“We have one of the toughest challenges ahead of us, so I will make sure I bring everything I have,” De Minaur said.

“It helps me feel pretty fresh, and it’s going to be a physical challenge. There are a lot of things Carlos does incredibly well on the tennis court, and one of them is making the rallies pretty physical.”

“I’m looking forward to what’s coming. I hope it will be a war and it will be a long one.”