Lloyd Harris

South Africa’s lone entrant in the men’s singles draw at this year’s Australian Open, Lloyd Harris, has lost in Round 2 of the tournament. Photo: Elsa/Getty Images

Lloyd Harris’ R1 MILLION pay day after Round 1 loss at Australian Open!

SA tennis ace Lloyd Harris suffered a shock Round 1 exit at the Australian Open, but did have R1 million reasons to keep his chin up!

Lloyd Harris

South Africa’s lone entrant in the men’s singles draw at this year’s Australian Open, Lloyd Harris, has lost in Round 2 of the tournament. Photo: Elsa/Getty Images

South Africa’s tennis ace Lloyd Harris suffered a shock first round exit at the Australian Open in Melbourne on Monday – but did have R1 million reasons to keep his chin up.

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Harris, who was the 30th seed at the tournament, lost 6-4, 3-6, 5-7, 6-7 (3/7) to little-known Australian wild card Aleksandar Vukic who will go on to play 124th-ranked Moldovia qualifier Radu Albot in the second round.

Vukic, 25, who is ranked a lowly 144th in the world, won the Court 3 match in two hours and 55 minutes.

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Such are the incredible fortunes on offer to tennis players these days, Lloyd Harris took home A$90 000 (R1 million) for his 175 minutes of work.

That equates to R5 715 per minute!

Not too shabby at all!

Of course, Harris would swap that for still being in the tournament.

Lloyd Harris contracted Covid-19 around Christmas

It was a disappointing, but perhaps unsurprising defeat for 24-year-old Capetonian Harris, whose preparations for the year’s opening Grand Slam was disrupted by a positive Covid-19 test shortly after Christmas.

That setback prevented him from travelling to Australia for a key warm-up event.

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