Australian Open 2026: Andy Lapthorne & Heath Davidson book their place in quad doubles final
• 2 minute read
British wheelchair tennis players kept themselves on course for two possible senior titles at the Australian Open on a busy Thursday at Melbourne Park.
Andy Lapthorne and Australia’s Heath Davidson booked their place in their first Grand Slam final together and Alfie Hewett reached his seventh successive Australian Open men’s singles semi-final.
In the quad doubles, Lapthorne and Davidson reached their fifth successive final together after winning a thrilling semi-final against South Africa’s Donald Ramphadi and Australia’s Jin Woodman 4-6, 7-6(8), 10-6.
The second seeds faced two match points in the second set tie-break, but prevailed to reach their first Grand Slam final as a partnership after two hours and 15 minutes.
Lapthorne will now bid to win his ninth Australian Open doubles title with a fourth different partner when he and Davidson face top seeds Guy Sasson and Niels Vink on Friday.
“It was a struggle," Lapthorne said. "Jin’s only young and he played incredible and Donald’s someone I’ve won a Grand Slam with (2023 French Open) and have so much respect for and we rode our luck a bit, especially on the match points. Someone definitely looks down on me when I’m playing on this court.
“We’ve been on opposite sides of the net to each other many times, especially here, and we’re really good mates so it’s great to get the opportunity to play together here and to get to another final.”
Hewett secured a 6-2, 6-3 victory over compatriot and doubles partner Gordon Reid in their second Australian Open men’s singles quarter-final since 2023, the world No.2 securing service breaks in the fourth game of both sets on his way to ninth win in 10 Grand Slam head-to-heads against Reid.
Hewett, who will now play Spain’s world No.3 Martin De La Puente in Friday’s semi-finals, said: “It’s definitely not easy to play your doubles partner We’ve played together for over 10 years and we’ve had a lot of discussions on and off court about each other’s games, so when it comes to singles it definitely makes it tricky for the both of us.
“I served well, but I demand a certain level from myself every singles point and I think I fluctuated a little bit too much out of that standard today. But as a whole, I think, when the real key moments in each game counted, I performed well.”
However, Hewett and Reid’s bid for a seventh successive men’s doubles title at Melbourne Park came to an end against current US Open champions Gustavo Fernandez of Argentina and Tokito Oda of Japan.
The match followed a similar pattern to their previous meeting in the final of the US Open men’s wheelchair doubles in New York last September, with Fernandez and Oda taking the opening set before Hewett and Reid built up a 4-0 second set lead.
However, a few errors at crucial times in the deciding match tie-break proved costly as Fernandez and Oda move on to the final 6-4, 2-6, 10-4.
