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Davis Cup 2017: Jordan Thompson and Nick Kyrgios give Australia a 2-0 lead against the Czechs at Kooyong

Linda Pearce

Australia are on the brink of a Davis Cup quarter-final place that should be delivered on Saturday afternoon, after debutant Jordan Thompson won the crucial first singles point against the Czech No.1, and a relaxed Nick Kyrgios made a winning return after being booed from Hisense Arena just over two weeks ago.

With Australian Open doubles champion John Peers and partner Sam Groth heavily favoured to secure victory against Jiri Vesely and Jan Satral in the likely absence of the injured Radek Stepanek, a 3-0 rout in the first round tie at Kooyong appears imminent. Even with Stepanek, the task would have been difficult; without him, it seems almost impossible.

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Nick Kyrgios back to his best

Nick Kyrgios aces his way past his Czech opponent in the World Number 15's first match since the Australian Open.

Captain Lleyton Hewitt praised both his singles players for different reasons: Thompson for outplaying a higher-ranked opponent - Vesely - in his maiden cup performance, and Kyrgios for handling what on paper was a massive mismatch but, in reality, is not always as straightforward as it seems.

"Thommo, we were quietly confident, he's put in a lot of hard work," said Hewitt, praising the work of the Australian coaching staff. "We spent a lot of time hitting with a left-hander, getting ready for this one match because we felt like this was the opportunity to crack it wide open, this tie, and Thommo handled the situation brilliantly today and played some great tennis.

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"Nick, a lot of people take it for granted that you come in, top 20 in the world and playing someone outside 100, and you should just walk all over 'em in Davis Cup. It's not that easy. Sometimes the tougher ones are when you are going in as the red hot favourite and the other guy can just free-wheel out there so it was a really professional job by Nick today to go out there, just get the job done and walk away and put us two-nil up and puts us in a pretty good position going into tomorrow."

Exceptionally good, in fact, with Bernard Tomic's unavailability proving to be far less problematic for the Australians than 12th-ranked Tomas Berdych's no-show for the Czechs. Thompson has dreamt of playing Davis Cup since watching Hewitt's famous comeback against Roger Federer in the 2003 semi-final, and was genuinely ecstatic after beating a misfiring Vesely 6-3, 6-3, 6-4.

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The 22-year-old described the the victory as the biggest of his career. "Unbelievably satisfying," said the improving world No.65. "I couldn't really describe it out there but that was the best feeling in my life, I reckon." The tone was set with a service break in the opening game. "That was huge," Thompson said. "Just to get off to a great start and break first game and then hold gave me a lot of confidence, and really relaxed me and I think I really took it from there and sort of ran away with the match."

Kyrgios, too, admitted to a few nerves before extending his Davis Cup singles record to 5-3. He knew only what Hewitt had told him about an unheralded opponent, the 157th-ranked Satral, although that changed little in a game plan that is no more complicated than "serve big, play big". The world No.15 finished the one-sided encounter 6-2, 6-3, 6-2 on his sixth match point, having shown off some party tricks, belted 21 aces and dropped just four of 20 points on his second serve in what was just his third tour-level match for the year.

"Obviously after the Australian Open it was tough," Kyrgios said, referring to his controversial second round loss to Andreas Seppi. "I didn't put in a great performance, got booed off the court, so to come back in front of the crowd as well, it wasn't easy. So I thought we both put in a good performance today.

The 1-0 advantage earned by Thompson had eased the pressure, Kyrgios said, allowed him to play freely, and get the Australians within one point of a likely fixture against the US in April. Yet while the Czechs have almost conceded defeat, Hewitt vowed to finish what has been started. "We won't be taking it easy. We're in a nice position, but we've got to close it out," he said. "I'm confident in our boys but we've still got to win one of the last three matches."