{"id":259633,"date":"2022-12-21T06:36:59","date_gmt":"2022-12-21T07:36:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=259633"},"modified":"2022-12-28T23:00:04","modified_gmt":"2022-12-28T23:00:04","slug":"kyrgios-ends-aussie-grudge-for-special-moment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=259633","title":{"rendered":"Kyrgios ends Aussie grudge for 'special' moment"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nick Kyrgios<\/a> \ufeffsaid he's ready to lead the Australian contingent at the inaugural United Cup<\/a>, despite being absent in his nation's recent tilt at the Davis Cup.<\/p>\n

The 27-year-old gave some pretty strong comments regarding his lack of attendance in the men's team tennis event<\/a>, and suggested that he was under-appreciated by audiences back home.<\/p>\n

"Maybe if Australia embraced me a little bit more, I would play it and bring home the trophy," he said earlier this month.<\/p>\n

Watch Nick Kyrgios and Team Australia take on the world in the United Cup, live and exclusive on<\/strong><\/em> 9Now<\/strong><\/em><\/a> and Stan Sport.\ufeff<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

"It's not always easy for me to erase everything in Australia that's said negatively about me or my family.<\/p>\n

"You don't need that \u2013 so it's interesting that they really want me to play, but are always criticising."<\/p>\n

Despite that, he will suit up in the new mixed gender tournament, which begins on Thursday in three different cities around Australia.<\/p>\n

"There's nothing better, to play the Australian summer is one of my favourite times of the year," Kyrgios said ahead of the United Cup.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

"Obviously being home, but being able to play in Sydney, in front of the home fans, my family, my friends, there's nothing more that I love."<\/p>\n

Australia will begin group play against Great Britain in Sydney, with Kyrgios taking on Cameron Norrie. He'll then face Rafael Nadal on January 2 when the host nation takes on Spain.<\/p>\n

"To be honest I've never really played that great in Sydney, but I'm hoping I'm going to change that narrative at the start of the year," Kyrgios said.<\/p>\n

"Just playing in Australia in general is special. The tour is a long grind and it's rarely in Australia, so I'm definitely not going to take it for granted."\ufeff<\/p>\n

Ahead of its inaugural running, here's everything you should know about the United Cup.\ufeff<\/p>\n

Watch Nick Kyrgios and Team Australia take on the world in the United Cup, live and exclusive on<\/strong><\/em> 9Now<\/strong><\/em><\/a> and Stan Sport.\ufeff<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

W\ufeffhat is the United Cup?<\/h3>\n

The United Cup is a round-robin tennis tournament, pitting players from 18 countries against each other \ufeffacross both men's and women's singles, as well as mixed doubles.<\/p>\n

\"United<\/p>\n

Which nations and players are competing? \ufeff<\/h3>\n

Six nations have earned their place based on the placement of their \ufefftop-ranked male player on the ATP rankings, six on the basis of the top female player on the WTA rankings, and the remaining six via a combination of the two.<\/p>\n

Group A<\/strong>: Greece, Bulgaria, Belgium<\/p>\n

Group B<\/strong>: Switzerland, Kazakhstan, Poland<\/p>\n

Group C<\/strong>: USA, Czech Republic, Germany<\/p>\n

Group D<\/strong>: Australia, Great Britain, Spain<\/p>\n

Group E<\/strong>: Italy, Brazil, Norway<\/p>\n

Group F<\/strong>: France, Argentina, Croatia<\/p>\n

Nine of both the men's and women's top 20 in the world and plenty of other stars will be competing, including: Iga Swiatek, Casper Ruud, Matteo Berrettini, Rafael Nadal, Paula Bados, Nick Kyrgios, Alex De Minaur, Alja Tomljanovic, Francis Tiafoe, Stefanos Tsitsipas, Maria Sakkari, Caroline Garcia, and Grigor Dimitrov.<\/p>\n

When is the United Cup?<\/h3>\n

Group play gets underway on Thursday, December 29 and runs until Wednesday, January 4 with the finals running from Friday, January 6 to Sunday, January 8.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/twitter.com\/StanSportAU\/status\/1607209612284928000?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw<\/a><\/p>\n

Where is the United Cup?<\/h3>\n

Group play will be held simultaneously across three cities with Groups A and F in Perth at RAC Arena, Groups B and E in Brisbane at Pat Rafter Arena, and Groups C and D in Sydney at Ken Rosewall Arena – the latter will also host the finals.<\/p>\n

How does the tournament work?<\/h3>\n

Each nation will play the other two in its group, with each tie settled across two singles matches of each gender, and a mixed doubles match.<\/p>\n

The group winners in each city (A vs F, B vs E, C vs D) will face off with each of the three winners, as well as the best-performing loser, advancing to the finals.<\/p>\n

How can I watch the United Cup?<\/h3>\n

The United Cup will be live and exclusive on Nine, 9Now and Stan Sport.\ufeff<\/p>\n

Watch Nick Kyrgios and Team Australia take on the world in the United Cup, live and exclusive on<\/strong><\/em> 9Now<\/strong><\/em><\/a> and Stan Sport.\ufeff<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

What is the prizemoney?<\/h3>\n

\ufeffThe tournament has a prize pool of $22.5 million, split evenly across the WTA and ATP players.<\/p>\n

For a daily dose of the best of the breaking news and exclusive content from Wide World of Sports, subscribe to our newsletter by<\/strong><\/em> clicking here<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nick Kyrgios \ufeffsaid he's ready to lead the Australian contingent at the inaugural United Cup, despite being absent in his nation's recent tilt at the […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/259633"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=259633"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/259633\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":259635,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/259633\/revisions\/259635"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=259633"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=259633"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=259633"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}