United Cup: world No. 1 returns, Czechs face Djokovic and China

Former world number one Angelique Kerber will return to competitive tennis at the upcoming second edition of the United Cup mixed team tournament in Sydney. The 35-year-old player from the Hanoverian city of Bremen became a mother to daughter Liana in February and has been absent from the WTA circuit for 18 months. The beautiful German player has also worked as a model.

The United Cup mixed team tournament is played from 29 December 2023 to 7 January 2024. Eighteen countries will be in action in two Australian cities. The good news is that we will also see the Czech Republic in one of the groups. The United Cup is a unique competition, plus its results are statistically included in both the men’s and women’s tennis tours.

As we have already mentioned, it is played in Perth and Sydney, each of these cities hosts three groups consisting of three teams. In the groups, each player faces each other, with individual matches consisting of a total of three matches – one singles match each for the men and women, followed by mixed doubles. The winners and the top two teams from the runners-up places advance to the quarter-finals. From the semi-finals onwards, only Sydney will play.

As last year, we will see the Czech Republic at the United Cup 2024 with a non-playing captain, the 47-year-old former excellent doubles player David Škoch, who has nominated Markéta Vondroušová, Jiří Lehečka, Sara Bejlek, Vít Kopřiva, Miriam Kolodzejová and Petr Nouza.

The Czech national team will play in Petrho, in Group E they will face China (Saturday 30 December at 03:00 a.m.) and Serbia (Tuesday 2 January at 03:00 a.m.). Novak Djokovic will also play for Serbia, while Qinwen Zheng will play for China.

A total of ten million US dollars will be distributed in the 2024 United Cup. Half will go to the men and half to the women. Each player can earn up to 500 points in the ATP and WTA tour rankings. The money at the United Cup is not only for matches won, but also for participation.

The United Cup 2023 was won by the United States team, and this year you can watch the aforementioned mixed team competition live on Premier Sport 3, on CANAL+ Sport 2, and the Australian mixed team tennis tournament will hopefully (at least according to the announcement) be found again on CT Sport.

“I’m not stressing and I’ll just let it flow. Normally I would know where I stand after the preparation. Now I’m tense myself, how it’s going to be,” said three-time Grand Slam champion Angelique Kerber, whose parents are from Poland, before the start of the United Cup.

The team competition, among other things, will allow Kerber a gradual warm-up with an eye on her first highlight of the season, which will be the Australian Open in January, where she plans to play. Poland is seeded as the number one team, with Hurkacz and Swiatek playing for them, while the Greeks are the number two team with Tsitsipas and Sakkari.

The other seeds are the United States and France, and the Czech Republic is number five in the tournament rankings. Brazil and Chile are among the outsiders, while Canada, Great Britain, Australia and possibly Germany could be the dark horses of the tournament.

Former world number one Angelique Kerber arrived in Sydney with her daughter and after the first practice session she is eager to play a competitive match. Kerber loves the Australian continent, she is the 2016 Australian Open winner. In the same year, she also dominated the US Open and played the Olympic singles final in Rio de Janeiro.

Two years later, she triumphed at Wimbledon. She will be joined on the German team by Alexander Zverev and doubles great Laura Siegmund. So it is not at all impossible that the former world number one could easily win her first tournament after her return to the professional courts after maternity leave!

Source: United Cup, ITF