BERLIN, June 10, 2020
German veteran Tommy Haas as well as Petra Kvitova from the Czech Republic have joined the line-up of the bett1ACES tennis exhibition in Berlin. This was announced by the organizers of the exhibition tournament on Tuesday.
On June 14, 2017, Haas celebrated his 569th and last match win on the ATP Tour at the MercedesCup in Stuttgart with a three-set victory over Roger Federer – by that time the Hamburg native had already taken over the role of the tournament director at the BNP Paribas Masters in Indian Wells. Haas retired from professional tennis later that year.
The 42-year-old German is still in good shape. While this year’s Indian Wells Masters 1000 event has been canceled due to the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic, Haas took some time out to practice with Austria’s Dominic Thiem, who was still in California.
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In July there will be a reunion between the 15-time ATP tournament champion Haas and current World No. 3 Thiem. Germany’s top player Alexander Zverev, Australia’s enfant terrible Nick Kyrgios and Italy’s #NextGenATP star Jannik Sinner will also be part of the men’s draw in Germany’s capital city.
“Anyone who knows me, is fully aware of the fact that I am not coming to Berlin for just being a good training partner. I will prepare myself intensively and professionally for the bett1ACES in the coming weeks. Of course I’m very excited to see how well I can cope with the level of my much younger opponents. In any case, the lack of match practice should not be particularly difficult, because the boys have hardly any serious competition in their legs because of the ongoing tournament’s suspension,” Haas was quoted in a press release.
Kvitova joins Svitolina and Bertens
Kvitova will join the women’s field, which is led by World No. 5 Elina Svitolina from the Ukraine and World No. 7 Kiki Bertens from the Netherlands. Local favourites Julia Görges and Andrea Petkovic will also come to Berlin to compete on home soil.
Thebett1ACES will feature a six-man and six-woman line-up taking place from July 13 to 19 at two different locations in Berlin. The first tournament will be played on grass at the Steff Graf Stadium of the LTTC „Rot-Weiß“ e.V. followed by the second event to be hosted at Berlin’s former international airport Tempelhof.
The tournament will feature a hygiene and protection concept that has been approved by authorities. Matches will be played without spectators but will be broadcast live on TV. The total prize money for both events will be €200,000.
