US Open: Francesca Jones starts qualifiers with victory

Top seed Francesca Jones took the first step to win her opening qualifier and headed to the U.S. Open, but Heather Watson was one of four British people who lost on Tuesday.
Britain’s fourth-ranked Jones defeated Slovakia’s Viktoria Helenzakova 6-3 6-4. She will face Georgia’s Ekaterine Gorgodze on Wednesday as she hopes to reach the U.S. Open for the first time in her career.
World 86 has never received a direct entry into the Grand Slam, and this time it almost missed, which means she is the number one seed in the qualifying round.
The 24-year-old continued for 1 hour and 22 minutes in a game and scored an 87% victory rate in her first place.
Meanwhile, former British No. 1 Watson was defeated by Gorgotz 6-3 3-6 4-6 as Gorgotz failed to enter the main draw for the fourth consecutive year.
The seventh place for British women, Harriet Dart, eliminated Romanian Anca Todoni, who was 112 above her ranking – 7-5 6-7 (3-7) 7-6 (10-6).
The fifth place for the British men, Jan Choinski, lost 6-4 to Argentina’s Andrea Collarini 7-6 (7-4), but Oliver Crawford beat Alex Bolt 5-7 6-4 6-4.
George Loffhagen was beaten 4-6 5-7 by Jason Kubler, while 22-year-old Jack Pinnington Jones was beaten 6-3 7-6 (8-6) 7-6 (14-12).
Jodie Burrage started her qualifying campaign with a victory on Monday, but Britain’s fifth Dan Evans was eliminated and the first major draw in the Grand Slam since 2018 will be missed.
In the second round of qualifying, six Britons were in action on Wednesday:
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Jodie Burrage v arantxa rus
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Jay Clarke v. Arthur Cazaux
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Billy Harris v mikhail kukushkin
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Harriet Dart V Ayana Akli
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Oliver Crawford v. Garrett Johns
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Fran Jones V Ekaterine Gorgodze
Players must win three games in the qualifying match to advance to the pre-summer tournament’s main singles match, which will begin on Sunday.
Jack Draper, Cameron Norrie and Jacob Fearnley went straight into the men’s singles, Emma Raducanu, Katie Boulter and Sonay Kartal in the women.



