Wimbledon 2014: Gaël Monfils and Richard Gasquet fall but Jo-Wilfried Tsonga battles on

Gaël Monfils made another early Wimbledon exit, this time at the hands of Jiri Vesely (AP)

It was a bad day for the French here as Richard Gasquet and Gaël Monfils, seeded 13 and 24 respectively, went out to two of tennis’s bright young things before Jo-Wilfried Tsonga restored some Gallic pride. All three matches were five-set epics, Tsonga’s having been held over from the previous night, just as his first-round encounter had been.

In an absorbing match on Court Two, the 19 year-old Australian Nick Kyrgios, the youngest man in the draw, saved nine match points to defeat Gasquet 3-6, 6-7, 6-4, 7-5, 10-8. Kyrgios is only competing after receiving a wild card for winning at Nottingham earlier this month but he delighted the noisy Australian supporters by coming from two sets down.

Next he will play the 20 year-old Czech Jiri Vesely, who defeated Monfils 7-6, 6-3, 6-7, 6-7, 6-4. “I’m always frustrated when I play on grass,” said Monfils, whose record here confirms it. “It’s very frustrating.”

Having dragged himself back into the match from two sets down, he would have been fancied to win, but Vesely, a tall left-hander who hit one serve of 143mph, remained the calmer man.

Tsonga, the 14th seed, has become used to the night-shift after having long matches suspended on Monday and Wednesday when the light faded. He resumed at 9-9 in the final set against American Sam Querrey – having saved a match point – broke for 13-12 and after a final game of close line-calls and challenges was able to celebrate. Querrey, who wanted to continue on Wednesday night, said afterwards that matches should start half an hour earlier at 11am.

Germany’s Philipp Kohlschreiber, the 22nd seed, went out to Simone Bolelli of Italy, ranked No 132, but there were few problems for Kei Nishikori, seeded 10 or Milos Raonic, eight. The Japanese saw off Denis Kudla 6-3, 6-2, 6-1 and the Canadian beat American Jack Sock in straight sets.

Roger Federer finished off Luxembourg’s Gilles Müller under the Centre Court roof after a rain delay late in the evening. Müller did well for two sets without winning many points on the Federer serve before going down 6-3, 7-5, 6-3.

Australian former champion Lleyton Hewitt was a set down to last year’s semi-finalist Jerzy Janowicz when rain caused the stoppage.