Two Australians, Taylah Preston (Western Australia) and Emerson Jones, have advanced to the third round in the Wimbledon 2023 girls’ singles competition.
It is the first time in 15 years, that two Australians have progressed to the third round in the Wimbledon girls’ singles competition.
Taylah Preston and Emerson Jones both posted hard-fought second-round victories at the All England Club on Monday to continue their bold runs.
Preston, a 17-year-old from Perth, triumphed 4-6 6-3 6-3 against 10th seed Tereza Valentova.
Valentova, a 16-year-old Czech, has been one of the world’s top-performing juniors this season. She was an Australian Open girls’ singles quarterfinalist and made the final at an ITF J300 tournament in Roehampton last week, where she scored a straight-sets victory against Preston in the quarterfinals.
However, Preston had the upper hand in this rematch, capitalising on her opponent’s 39 unforced errors. The Australian played a much cleaner match, recording only 19 unforced errors of her own.
This equals Preston’s career-best singles result at a junior Grand Slam, having also made third-round appearances at Roland Garros and the US Open last year.
Preston, who broke into the world’s top 10 junior rankings last season, has been predominantly playing at the professional level this season. She claimed her first ITF singles title in May and achieved a career-high ranking of world No.414 last month.
Preston will take on Japanese eighth seed, Ena Koike later today.
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