Alex de Minaur is out of Wimbledon, beaten 7-5, 7-6(4), 6-3 by ninth seed Flavio Cobolli in Monday's fourth round, and with him goes the last Australian in either singles draw.
The fifth seed had the match in his hands twice on No.1 Court. He led 5-2 in the second set, then went a break up in the third, and both times the 24-year-old Italian reeled him in, closing out the two-hour, 34-minute match with a 135mph serve on match point.
De Minaur, ranked six in the world, did not dress it up. "It breaks me inside. That's the reality of it," he said. "To not step up to the plate, it's truly gut-wrenching." He has reached seven grand slam quarter-finals without going further, and this time did not get that far. His best Wimbledon run remains 2024, when a hip injury in the final points of his fourth-round win forced him out before a quarter-final against Novak Djokovic.
The 27-year-old's season has not been thin. He won the Rotterdam title in February and made the final at 's-Hertogenbosch last month. But he said he "won't play a tournament for a while", with his wedding to British player Katie Boulter among the bigger items on his calendar.
Cobolli keeps climbing. The world No.10 is into back-to-back Wimbledon quarter-finals, the third Italian man to reach more than one after Nicola Pietrangeli and Jannik Sinner, a month after his first major final at Roland Garros. "Alex is a stratospheric player. So beating him three sets to none makes me feel like I'm ready," he said, after celebrating match point with a Cristiano Ronaldo goal celebration. "I love his celebration. I love him. I will cheer for Portugal tonight because of Ronaldo."
His quarter-final looks the kindest of the eight on paper: British wild card Arthur Fery, ranked 114, who grew up minutes from the All England Club and beat Grigor Dimitrov in a three-hour, 55-minute five-setter on Centre Court to become the fifth wild card of the Open era to reach the men's last eight here.
The rest of the bracket has its shape. Defending champion Jannik Sinner plays Jan-Lennard Struff on Tuesday. Novak Djokovic, fresh from his 106th Wimbledon singles win to pass Roger Federer's men's record, meets Felix Auger-Aliassime, while Taylor Fritz awaits the winner of the Zverev-Lehecka match, suspended at Monday's curfew with Alexander Zverev two sets up.
Daria Kasatkina, the last Australian woman in the singles, went out to Naomi Osaka in the third round. De Minaur heads home without naming his next tournament, and the quarter-finals begin Tuesday without an Australian in them.
