(Adelaide) Canadian Victoria Mboko scored her second career victory against a player from top 10Thursday, winning 6-4, 4-6 and 6-2 against the American Madison Keys to reach the semi-finals of the Adelaide tournament.

Mboko (17^e), who is looking for a third WTA title, will cross swords with Australian Kimberly Birrell (107^e). Mboko defeated Birrell in Montreal, en route to the National Bank Open title last summer, in their only other duel on the circuit.

Mboko had previously defeated the Brazilian Beatriz Haddad Maia (59^e) and the Russian Anna Kalinskaya (33^e) in Adelaide. This is her first tournament since Hong Kong, which she won in November 2025.

Keys (ninth) had won his last 11 matches in this tournament, winning the title last year. She also triumphed there in 2022. Last year, she then continued her momentum to lift the Australian Open trophy.

After suffering three breaks in the second set, Mboko was solid in the third set with balls in hand, giving Keys no break opportunities. In particular, she won 73% of the rallies with her second ball during the third round.

Mboko won 93 of 180 points (52%) in this match.

(Melbourne) Marina Stakusic and Liam Draxl won their respective qualifying matches on Thursday to secure their tickets to the main draw of the Australian Open tennis tournament.

Stakušić (127^e) joins Leylah Annie Fernandez and Victoria Mboko in the Canadian women’s delegation, while Draxl, who will participate in a major tournament for the first time, joins Félix Auger-Aliassime, Gabriel Diallo and Denis Shapovalov on the men’s side.

Stakusic took advantage of the troubles in the service of Lin Zhu (163^e) to win 7-5 and 6-4.

The Canadian, who defeated the Spaniard Nuria Parrizas-Diaz (261^e) and the Serbian Teodora Kostovic (176^e) during the first two rounds of qualifying, will be making his first appearance in the main draw of this major tournament. This will be her second Grand Slam appearance after being eliminated in the first round at Wimbledon in 2024.

To achieve this, Stakusic managed four breaks in the first set and two more in the second set. She gave herself eight break points. Zhu only won 49% of rallies when she had the balls in hand.

Stakusic herself lost her serve four times. She called a timeout to bring in a therapist after Zhu made it 3-2 in the first set.

After letting a first match point slip away, Stakusic ended the match in the next game. The duel lasted one hour 42 minutes.

Aged 32, Zhu occupied number 31^e WTA rank in September 2023, but injuries to her elbow and hips caused her to miss several months of activities over the past two years. She was 493^e in the world when she reached the fourth round of the National Bank Open last summer in Montreal.

Later, Draxl (145^e) came from behind to defeat the American Mackenzie McDonald (113^e) 3-6, 7-6 (2) and 6-2.

Draxl had previously had the ascendancy over the Australian Moerani Bouzige (467^e) and the Ukrainian Vitaliy Sachko (166^e).

He hit nine aces and took advantage of five of his eight break points.

(Melbourne) Quebecer Félix Auger-Aliassime will face Portuguese Nuno Borges in the first round of the Australian Open tennis tournament, while Leylah Annie Fernandez will face Indonesian Janice Tjen, the draw revealed on Thursday.

Auger-Aliassime (seventh) won his only duel against Borges (46^e), last year in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. He could face the German Alexander Zverev, third racket in the world, in the quarter-finals.

Fernandez (22^e) and Tjen (56^e) will play against each other for the first time. Fernandez could meet American defending champion Madison Keys (ninth) in the third round.

Quebecer Gabriel Diallo (41^e) will have a lot to do if he wants to reach the second round, since he will face Zverev in the initial round.

The other Canadian in the running, Ontario’s Denis Shapovalov (23^e), has a meeting with the Chinese Yunchaokete Bu (64^e).

Among the women, the representative of the maple leaf Victoria Mboko (17^e) must face the Australian Emerson Jones (155^e). She could cross paths with Belarusian Aryna Sabalenka, first in the world, in the fourth round.

Canadian Marina Stakusic also qualified for the main draw, a few hours before the draw.

Americans Coco Gauff and Venus Williams could meet in the second round, more than six years after they first faced each other in a major tournament. Gauff was 15 when she defeated Williams in the first round at Wimbledon.

Williams will also be the oldest player to participate in the Australian Open. At 45, she will overtake Japanese Kimiko Date, who was 44 when she lost in the first round in 2015.

The main draw matches will begin on Sunday.

In Thursday’s draw, Gauff was chosen to begin her journey against Kamilla Rakhimova, ranked 91^ewhile Williams, ranked 576^ewho made her Australian Open debut in 1998 and reached the final twice, will face 68th-ranked Olga Danilovic^ein the first round.

Gauff and Williams are in the same half of the draw as world No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka, who won back-to-back titles at Melbourne Park before losing in the final last year to American Madison Keys.

Sabalenka, who started her season by winning the title in Brisbane last week, could face 2021 U.S. Open champion Emma Raducanu in the third round.

Defending champion Keys, who lost her quarter-final match in Adelaide in three sets on Thursday against Canadian Victoria Mboko, is in the same portion of the draw as her compatriots Jessica Pegula (No. 6) and Amanda Anisimova (No. 4).

World No. 2 Iga Swiatek, who hopes to complete her career Grand Slam by winning a first title at Melbourne Park, is in the bottom quarter of the table and could face the holder of four career major titles, Japan’s Naomi Osaka, in the fourth round.

On the men’s side, Jannik Sinner and Novak Djokovic find themselves in the same half of the draw, which could result in a semi-final between the reigning champion and the winner of 24 career majors.

Djokovic, who has won 10 Australian Open titles but has not advanced past the semi-finals at Melbourne Park since 2023, played a friendly against American Frances Tiafoe at Rod Laver Arena, hours after the draw. He withdrew from a preseason tournament in Adelaide last week to give himself more time to prepare for the Australian Open.

World No. 1 Carlos Alcaraz is in the side opposite Sinner and Djokovic, along with Tiafoe and sixth-seeded Australian Alex De Minaur.

With the Associated Press