The opening day of the Mexican Open has seen two high-profile exits from the tournament, with Alex de Minaur and Cameron Norrie being knocked out.
Second seed de Minaur suffered a shock 6-1, 6-7(4), 7-6(4), loss to American qualifier Patrick Kypson. The Australian was on the verge of victory when leading 5-3 in the decider, but got broken when serving for the match. Then in the tiebreak, he opened up an early 2-0 lead before dropping serve three times, which guided Kypson to his first win over a top 10 player on the Tour.
“It feels amazing,” Kypson said of his win. “Everything was important. I had to serve well. I had to return well. I hit my forehand really big. Luckily, I was able to do those things for a pretty extended period of time.”
Coming into Mexico, De Minaur was on a five-match winning streak after winning the Rotterdam Open. It is the first time he has lost in the opening round of a tournament since August, when he lost his opening match at the Cincinnati Masters to Reilly Opelka.
The 2023 and 2024 champion had 17 consecutive wins over players outside the top 20 before losing to Kypson, who will play Brandon Nakashima in the second round.
Another seed to fall is Cameron Norrie, who reached the final of the tournament in 2022 before losing to Rafael Nadal. Norrie was swept aside 6-3, 6-2 by Spanish teenager Rafael Jódar. Jodar has enjoyed a solid start to 2026 after reaching the final of a Challenger event in Canberra before qualifying for his first Grand Slam main draw at the Australian Open, where he made it to the second round.
“I have been travelling a lot, playing a lot of tournaments,” Jodar said during an interview with ATPTour.com. “I haven’t had two or three weeks at home to relax and [process] what I am doing. But I am just trying to enjoy the process and every step I am taking in this beautiful process. I am trying to play all the tournaments I can and enjoy all the places I am able to play and it means a lot to me.”
19-year-old Jodar won the 2024 US Open boys’ title. By beating Norrie, he has become only the fourth man born in 2006 or later to win a match at ATP 500 level. He is on the verge of breaking into the top 100 and currently sits in 101st place in the live standings.
Jodar will play either France’s Térence Atmane or Grigor Dimitrov in the next round.
Top seed Alexander Zverev will kick off his campaign later this week against world No.35 Corentin Moutet.
