Australian Open 2026 live: Matteo Berrettini withdraws from first round against Alex De Minaur as grand slam tournament starts

The 45-year-old American legend is at Melbourne Park on day one.

Williams faces Serbian world number 68 Olga Danilović in their first-round match tonight on John Cain Arena.

If Williams can pull off an upset and reach the second round, the oldest woman to ever play the Australian Open singles draw would come up against Coco Gauff, the third seed who is less than half her age and has spoken in the past about how the Williams sisters inspired her to pick up a racquet.

We're not sure of the exact start time for Williams and Danilović, but it will be after Australian qualifier Jason Kubler meets American 29th seed Frances Tiafoe from around 5pm AEDT.

Australian 21-year-old wildcard Talia Gibson is first up on Kia Arena from 11am AEDT, taking on Russian world number 62 Anna Blinkova.

Gibson, ranked 119th in the world, will be hoping to crack the top 100 for the first time if she can better her career-best Australian Open performance of a second-round exit.

Hers is one of five matches starting at 11am.

John Cain Arena:

1573 Arena:

ANZ Arena:

Court Six:

In tennis, one player's misfortune can make life infinitely easier for another and that's certainly the case for Australian number one Alex de Minaur.

Luckless Italian Matteo Berretini has been forced to withdraw from the Australian Open on the eve of the tournament.

The former Wimbledon finalist and current world number 56 had withdrawn from exhibition matches in Melbourne with what reported to be a mystery illness but it appears it's another injury.

"It's never easy to take this kind of decisions (sic) but unfortunately I've felt a discomfort in my obliques once again and I won't be ready to perform at my best level for 5 sets," Berrettini wrote on Instagram.

"It hurts because playing in Australia has always been special and after 4 weeks of intense training I was excited and ready to get going. I'm hoping and feeling that I won't be out from the tennis courts for a long time."

De Minaur will now play American lucky loser and world number 113 Mackenzie McDonald in the first round on centre court on Monday afternoon.

Tennis season is truly underway now as the Australian Open kicks off on Sunday for another year.

We've got a bunch of on-court action to get into so we won't mess around except to say welcome to the first of 15 ABC Sport live blogs over the next two weeks of the first tennis grand slam of the year.

I'm Jon Healy and I'm just one of a whole mess of people who'll be taking you through the action from Melbourne Park, so let's get straight into it.

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