MELBOURNE – Five quick thoughts from a wacky Day 4 at the 2018 Australian Open.
• In 2019, tennis’ majors will pare back to 16 seeded players from the current 32. The rationale: this will breed more first round upsets and more competitive matches. True as that may be, this event suggests that no more randomness is needed. This tournament has been a big bowl of close matches. Grigor Dimitrov, the third seed, needed to go 8-6 in the fifth set to survive Mackie McDonald, a former NCAA champ from UCLA who needed to qualify. Caroline Wozniacki staved off two match points to survive her second round match.