Guy den Ouden suffered a painful defeat on Monday in his debut at the Wimbledon qualifying tournament. The world number 175 missed three match points against Austrian Filip Misolic and lost 3-6, 6-1 and 7-5.
The 23-year-old Den Ouden was three times one point away from victory at 5-4 in the third set, but all three match points were saved by Misolic. A game later, Den Ouden lost his service game, after which the Austrian number 110 in the world convincingly finished the match.
Den Ouden is having a strong period. In May he reached the final of a challenger in Prague and at the beginning of this month he reached the final of a challenger in Heilbronn, Germany. As a result, he is now the number four in the Netherlands, behind Tallon Griekspoor, Botic van de Zandschulp and Jesper de Jong.
Earlier in the day, Gijs Brouwer also failed to survive the first round of qualifying. Brouwer was quite chanceless against the Japanese Yasutaka Uchiyama. The score was 6-2 and 6-3. For the 29-year-old Brouwer, it was his first match since the Roland Garros qualifiers.
On Tuesday it is the turn of Arianne Hartono and Anouk Koevermans, the only two Dutch women in the qualifying tournament.
The Wimbledon qualifiers are played in Roehampton. The preliminary rounds are not played on the Wimbledon complex to spare the grass for the main tournament, which starts on Monday.