The most unlikely top 20 player of the modern era?

(Getty/William West)

In September last year, he lost in the opening round of a French challenger and had a total of 11 ATP Tour-level wins to his name. This week, he booked his ticket to the third round of the Australian Open as the tournament's 30th seed.

His name is Valentin Vacherot, and he might be the most unlikely player to (soon) find himself in the world's top 20 in recent memory after defeating Australian Rinky Hijikata 6-1, 6-3, 4-6, 6-2 in front of a disappointed home crowd on Kia Arena on Thursday.

For Vacherot, the win marks his first at a Grand Slam, having only ever once appeared in the main draw (Roland-Garros 2024), after rising from tennis obscurity to the main stage in a matter of months.  

That might seem like hyperbole, but Vacherot's ranking couldn't even get him into the qualifying cut-off for the US Open last August, before he later had the run of his lifetime to win the Shanghai Masters from qualifying, which included wins over Novak Djokovic and Holger Rune, amongst others.  

The First Serve Live returns on Monday February 2nd at 8pm AEDT for its 18th year on the SEN Network/App, Australia's only dedicated weekly tennis program on commercial radio running through till the end of November.

Unsurprisingly, despite the fanfare he received as the (improbable) champion of the Shanghai Masters, Vacherot remains a relative unknown for the Melbourne Park crowd - as evidenced by his lowly Court 13 allocation for his opening-round match.  

And not only is he a new face for the Australian public, but he's new to five-set tennis and new to the pressure of being a seed. 

"For the first time in my life, I lost the third set and didn't lose the match," Vacherot joked with the Kia Arena crowd. 

"It's weird. I don't even think about the fact that I'm seeded," he then later said to the press after his round one win. 

"[I was like] this little kid today that was going to play a three-out-of-five match because my first one was two years ago. 

"It was my second one today. My first one straightaway in the main draw."

Amazingly, it will be a season full of firsts for Vacherot, who finds himself in the enviable position of having barely a couple of hundred ranking points to defend between now and September.   

Some of these firsts will include playing players for the first time, or at least the first time at this level, as his upcoming third-round opponent Ben Shelton noted in his press conference on Thursday. 

"I played him in one of the early Challengers I played, and we had an absolute war," Shelton recalled. 

"I think I beat him 5 or 6 in the third. Even since he was in college, he's always been a problem.

"I'm not shocked to see him in the top 100 and having great results on the tour. I think that he has a lot of weapons. I think he's great physically. I think he's a tough competitor. Yeah, I think it's a great third-round matchup."

After defeating Hijikata in the second round, Vacherot will rise to at least No.26 in the world and potentially higher if he can prevail against 8th seed Ben Shelton on Saturday. 

In fact, even if his tournament does end at the hands of Shelton, Vacherot will be barely 300 ranking points behind 20th-ranked Italian Flavio Cobolli.  

Averaged out over the nine months between now and when his Shanghai result eventually falls off his ranking, the Texas A&M alumni needs barely more than a few tour-level wins a month to creep into the top 20.  

Given the opportunity his ranking provides, this should come easily to the 6ft 4in tour rookie - although he doesn't seem too concerned keeping score. The Monaco resident just wants to keep winning. 

"I'm sure so many people thought it was just the one week [of good form]," he said.  

"Then even though I did well after [Shanghai] in Paris as well, it was probably just about my confidence of the moment, so I'm just happy to win as many matches as I can. 

"If some people were wondering if I had the level, maybe they have more answers, but me, I don't look much at social media and everything, so I don't read about any of that.

"I just play tennis and try to play as good this season and every tournament. 

“We'll see. We do the counts at the end."

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