Hewitt, Gaudio, Dimitrov Join Former Greats To Captain ATP Cup Teams

Lleyton Hewitt

ATP CUP Press Release, December 13, 2019

Lleyton Hewitt, Gaston Gaudio and Grigor Dimitrov will join a glittering line-up of past tennis champions, including former No.1s Boris Becker (Germany), Marat Safin (Russia) and Thomas Muster (Austria), along with British great Tim Henman (Great Britain) as team captains when the inaugural ATP Cup gets underway in January.

Hewitt will lead the Aussies in Brisbane, with #NextGenATP star Alex de Minaur and No.2 Nick Kyrgios committed to representing the home side in the brand new event taking place across three cities in Australia from 3-12 January 2020.

“We’re in a tough section but I’d give the Aussies a strong chance of beating any team,” Hewitt said.

“The guys are really excited to be playing in this new competition, it’s a game changer and it would mean so much to all of us to take it out.”

Becker, captain of the German side, is a former world No.1 and six-time major winner, the first title coming at Wimbledon in 1985 at the age of 17 and the last 11 years later at the 1996 Australian Open.

The Germans, including world No.7 Alexander Zverev, will compete in Brisbane against Group F’s Greece, Canada and Australia.

Crowd favourite Safin, winner of the 2000 US Open and the centenary Australian Open in 2005, will captain a formidable Russian team spearheaded by two of the fastest rising players in tennis, Daniil Medvedev and Karen Khachanov.

Russia is drawn to play against Italy, USA and Norway in Group D, who will play their matches in Perth.

Muster rounds out the quartet of former world No.1 captains, leading Austria in Group E, bound for Sydney against Croatia, Argentina and Poland.

Known as the King of Clay in his heyday, Muster rose to world No.1 in 1996 and won 44 career titles, including 1995 Roland Garros.

Henman, who inspired a British tennis revival in the 1990s becoming the first local player to reach the men’s semifinals at Wimbledon in 25 years, will captain a five-man squad featuring three-time Grand Slam champion Andy Murray, his brother Jamie Murray and current British No.1 Dan Evans.

They will head to Sydney in Group C alongside Belgium, Bulgaria with Grigor Dimitrov as playing captain, and Moldova.

“As a rookie captain, I like the fact that we’ve got options on the singles court, and with doubles,” Henman said.

“There are always going to be Brits in Australia, so there’s no doubt we’ll have great support, and fingers crossed we can give them something to shout about.”

Also chosen in the role of captain by their top players is 2004 Roland Garros champion Gaston Gaudio who will oversee Argentina’s campaign, while former No.1 doubles champion Nenad Zimonjic leads Serbia, and Apostolos Tsitsipas, the father and coach of world No.6 Stefanos Tsitsipas, captains Greece. Elsewhere, current world No.55 Gilles Simon will captain France’s team led by world No.10 Gael Monfils 

For 10 days leading into Australian Open 2020, 24 countries will battle it out over six days and three cities before eight leading teams head to Sydney for the Final Eight knock-out stages heading into the final.

Teams have qualified based on the highest singles ranking of their best player, with each team featuring between three and five players. See list of committed players here.

The ATP Cup champions will share in AUD $22 million prizemoney and a maximum of 750 ATP singles rankings points and 250 ATP doubles rankings points.

The full list of captains are:

CITY

GROUP

COUNTRY

CAPTAIN

BRISBANE

A

Serbia

Nenad Zimonjic

 

 

France

Gilles Simon

 

 

South Africa

Jeff Coetzee

 

 

Chile

Paul Capdeville

 

 

 

 

BRISBANE

F

Germany

Boris Becker

 

 

Greece

Apostolos Tsitsipas

 

 

Canada

Adriano Fuorivia

 

 

Australia

Lleyton Hewitt

 

 

 

 

PERTH

B

Spain

Francisco Roig

 

 

Japan

Satoshi Yabushi

 

 

Georgia

David Kvernadze

 

 

Uruguay

Felipe Maccio

 

 

 

 

PERTH

D

Russia

Marat Safin

 

 

Italy

Vincenzo Santopadre

 

 

USA

David Macpherson

 

 

Norway

Christian Ruud

 

 

 

 

SYDNEY

C

Belgium

Steve Darcis

 

 

Great Britain

Tim Henman

 

 

Bulgaria

Grigor Dimitrov

 

 

Moldova

Vladimir Albot

 

 

 

 

SYDNEY

E

Austria

Thomas Muster

 

 

Croatia

Luka Kutanjac

 

 

Argentina

Gaston Gaudio

 

 

Poland

Marcin Matkowski

Full schedule: https://www.atpcup.com/schedule

Tickets: https://www.atpcup.com/tickets