Qualifying in Melbourne

Made down to Melbourne and the flight wasn't that bad, though at the start there was a bit of shaking as it took off in bad weather and there was an annoying little kid crying all the time, though the adult was worse. Once the plane takes off, and it hasn't crashed I think it's going to be alright.

Had a friend of a friend go with me today for a few hours. He wants to come to the tennis during the week and it was best to show him around when there wasn't people around and get the hang of the venue and it was the first time he saw live tennis and appreciated it and now Michael Russell has two fans.

First match was the only American that I can cheer for Michael Russell against Aldi who was seeded in this section and beat Froggy Ferrer in Palermo last year. I got there as Russell was losing and this was a claycourt match on a hardcourt and we enjoyed this of course. It's great to see Russell back on the tour, he is a friendly guy and gets on with the job and he has had so many problems with his knees and came back to tennis in September and thankfully for me, he won a challenger in Florida, so that he can play here.

There were plenty of breaks of serve in the 1st set and once Russell got the final break and served it out to hold for 5-4 and after a racquet change, he then started hitting the ball deeper and used some good angles and wore down Aldi in the end and ran through him 6-1 in the second set.

Vinciguerra is back on court and sadly he lost to Meffert, who has these big tattooes and just closes his eyes and swings and hopes for the best and it worked for him. Vinci fought hard, but he was a bit slow and needs his footspeed a lot and this match showed there is a lot to go. It's not like the WTA, where a player can come back after 3 years and start doing well. Just hope no more injuries and use this is a springboard to relaunch his career.

Adam Chadaj was awesome in his match and his afro was awesome and he might even get used to the fact he has fans. Then Koubek was on and it wasn't a good performance, he had so many break points and the guy he played wasn't much chop and if Koubi didn't beat him in straight sets, then he should have a good look at himself, luckily he didn't do that.

Filip Prpic the Croatian Swede played a very good match against oui oui Dupuis and hardly made any unforced errors and oui oui was getting pissed off and lost this match easily in the end. Ilja Bozoljac and Tabara had a huge battle that went down to 13-11 in the 3rd set and Bozo got a dead netcord on his break point and after the match Tabara went apeshit with his racquet.

Last match of the day was Oli Marach over Cecil Mamit. Marach was toying with him and hitting very well, though he doesn't like linespeople taking the piss out of them when they made a call on his footfaults and Mamit was crying like a bitch at the end of the match with an overrule that hit the line. Oli done well and really should qualify for the main draw.

Good solid day and should be fun for the next 2 days.