Félix Auger-Aliassime celebrates winning against Croatia's Dino Prizmic during their men's singles second round tennis match at the 2026 Wimbledon Championships in southwest London on Wednesday.HENRY NICHOLLS/AFP/Getty Images
It wasn’t that long ago when Canadian players were wowing tennis fans at Wimbledon and among the game’s rising stars. That’s not the case this year.
Every Canadian except Félix Auger-Aliassime has been eliminated from the singles competition and the tournament isn’t even a week old.
Denis Shapovalov, Bianca Adreescu and Leylah Fernandez went out on the first day. Gabriel Diallo lost his second-round match on Thursday.
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Shapovalov retired after crashing into a post while trailing Spain’s Pablo Carreno Busta 3-6, 6-7. Both Fernandez, who was the 22nd seed, and Andresscu lost in straight sets and Diallo fell 6-7, 6-4, 6-7, 7-6, 2-6, to Italy’s Lorenzo Sonega.
One of Canada’s brightest stars, world No. 10 Victoria Mboko, didn’t even get to Wimbledon. She injured her knee last month during a warm-up tournament at London’s Queen’s Club.
The lone bright spot has been Auger-Aliassime, the third seed, who has not lost a set yet and advanced to the third round on Friday. His next opponent is Michael Zheng, a qualifier from the United States who has been impressive this season.
Zheng has qualified for three straight Grand Slams – the Australian Open, the French Open and Wimbledon – and he beat Britain’s Cameron Norrie in the first round earlier this week. He went on to defeat Nicolas Mejia of Colombia in round two.
Michael Zheng on day one of Wimbledon 2026 on Monday.Cameron Spencer/Getty Images
The 22-year-old New Yorker is a two-time NCAA singles champion and came into Wimbledon ranked 144th in the world.
“I like how he plays. He’s very tricky, he’s got a great tennis IQ, got great ball control. It’s going to be a tough one. It’s not a surprise he’s in the third round,” Auger-Aliassime said of Zheng this week.
Doubles isn’t shaping up much better for Canadians. Fernandez and her partner Yulia Putintseva of Khazikstan, lost in the first-round on Thursday 2-6, 6-1, 3-6.
Fernandez is also playing mixed doubles with Britain’s Joe Salisbury.
Canada’s Gabriela Dabrowski and Brazil’s Luisa Stefani Dabrowski start play on Friday as the second seeds. They won the Eastbourne Open last month which was Dabrowski’s third title of the season.
It’s not clear how badly Shapovalov was hurt or when he’ll return. He was chasing down a shot during the second set tie break on Monday when he hit protective covering around the wall of Court 6. He called for medical treatment and played the next point, losing the tie break 7-9. After further treatment he bowed out.
Mboko said she damaged the medial collateral ligament in her left knee and had to pull out of the grass court season. “I am receiving the best medical care and my team and I are focused on a return to court as soon as possible,” she said in a post on Instagram.
Victoria Mboko, left, retires injured during her match against Karolina Pliskova of Czech Republic on day three of the Queen's Club tennis championships in London last month.Ben Whitley/The Associated Press
She’d made her mark at Wimbledon last year. After losing in qualifying, Mboko got into the main draw as a lucky loser when Austria’s Anastasia Potapova pulled out due to injury. Mboko made it into the second round, beginning a remarkable ride that saw her climb from outside the top 300 at the start of 2025 to world No. 9 earlier this year.
Auger-Aliassime will be hoping he can go a step or two farther at Wimbledon this year than the quarter-finals, which he reached in 2021.
He advanced to the quarter-finals of the French Open for the first time last month before losing in four sets to Italian Flavio Cobolli. He’s also the only Canadian man to reach the quarter-finals at all four Grand Slam tournaments.
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“I can’t complain with my life, but I’m in a place right now with my career that it’s tough,” he said after the loss to Cobolli. He added: “I usually handle losses pretty well. My whole career, I was going back to training with optimism and positivity. Now I feel as if I’m not the player I want to be, so today is a difficult day.”
He backed up that statement this week at Wimbledon. “I think it was realistic of the circumstances. And I do want to be a better player than I am today,” he said after his first-round win.