Cruz Hewitt earns junior Australian Open wildcard in echoes of father’s famous debut

More than 25 years after his father embarked on one of Australian Tennis’ most storied careers, Cruz Hewitt will make his entry into the Australian Open Junior Championships.

At 15 years old Cruz is one year older than his two-time Grand Slam-winning father Lleyton was when he made his junior Open debut back in 1996 one year before his famous main draw debut in 1997.

Cruz is currently ranked 199 in his boys rankings age group and snagged one of 10 wildcard entries into the junior tournament.

It will be Cruz’s first Grand Slam tournament when the championships get underway on January 20.

However, his wildcard entry is not on his name alone with Cruz putting together a strong body of work towards the back end of 2023 including three junior title wins while also spending some time on the men’s tennis circuit.

In his most recent action, Cruz fell in the second round of his junior tour clash in country Victoria though he did claim the scalp of junior world No.9 American Kaylan Bigun in the first round.

Cruz has not yet qualified for the main draw of a men’s tournament having reached the final hurdle twice and most recently spent time getting pointers from Aussie men’s number one Alex de Minaur and 2020 US Open winner Dominic Thiem.

After Lleyton’s debut in 1996 the former World No.1 was a staple in Melbourne for two straight decades though fell agonisingly short of a home Grand Slam title in a four-set defeat to Russian Marat Safin in 2005.