Alexei Popyrin on medication and injured his glute in opening round loss at Melbourne Park

Australian No.2 Alexei Popyrin will put his failed Australian Open campaign “in the bin” as he faces time on the sidelines with a glute injury that impacted his “shocking” opening round defeat on Tuesday night.

Having returned home with a career-high ranking and seeded 25 at Melbourne Park off the back of his “best year” of tennis in 2024, which included taking down Novak Djokovic at the US Open, the 25-year-old revealed he had been sick “for four days” leading into the four-set loss to Corentin Moutet.

Despite the challenges, Popyrin, who wasn’t named in Australia’s four-man team for a Davis Cup tie in Sweden at the end of January, walked away from Melbourne Park, having also lost in the opening round at the Brisbane International, declaring there was “not really much I can take from it”.

“Throughout the week I have had little niggles, had an abdominal niggles. I’ve been sick for four days. Still am sick. Had to go to the doctor’s office today to get some meds,” he said.

“It’s not an excuse, nothing like that for me. I’m disappointed with the way I played. I take full responsibility with the way that I played, and it was shocking. It was really bad.”

“I’m going to have to take a few days, a week off, let it all sink in. It’s been a very disappointing month for me, come to Australia off the back of your best year, lose for two matches is not something I kind of expected.

“We’re going to have to take a step back, look at what went wrong, and just work from there.”

Popyrin said he suffered the glute injury during the game and “knew what it was” having gone through a similar issue before.

It compounded an ugly return home he said he wanted to move on from quickly.

“It was shocking tennis from myself. Not really much I can take from it,” he said.

“I’m just going to throw it in the bin and forget because it’s not been great.”