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Defending champion Rafael Nadal will face young Englishman Jack Draper in the first round of the Australian Open in a bid to retain his 2022 crown and extend his Grand Slam tally.
World No. 1 Carlos Alcaraz may miss the tournament due to injury, but with Novak Djokovic returning to competition, Nadal will have a tough time defending his title.
Thursday's draw was not kind to the 22-time Grand Slam winner: if he defeats world No. 40 Draper, he will potentially face reigning Next Gen ATP Finals champion Brandon Nakashima.
Potentially awaiting the Spaniard later was a quarter-final match against Daniil Medvedev, who was Nadal's opponent in last year's epic five-set final. Medvedev will look to reach a third consecutive final after losing to Djokovic in 2021 and Nadal in 2022.
A rematch of the 2021 final is on the cards, with Djokovic in the opposite half to Nadal and Medvedev. The nine-time Australian Open champion faces another Spaniard, Roberto Carballés Baena, in the first round and is on course to face local favorite Nick Kyrgios in the quarter-finals.
The tournament comes 12 months after Djokovic was deported from Australia on the eve of the 2022 edition, after former immigration minister Alex Hawke found the tennis star posed a risk to public health and order because, As a famous athlete who had previously expressed his opposition to people being forced to receive the Covid-19 vaccine, he could be seen as an “icon” for anti-vaxxers.
The minister's decision to deport the former world number one meant he was initially banned from re-entry for three years.
Kyrgios, seeded 19th, is part of an exciting section of the draw that includes Holger Rune, Dan Evans and Andrey Rublev.
Russian Rublev enters the Australian Open as the fifth seed, but suffered a shock loss to World No. 110 Thanasi Kokkinakis at Adelaide 2 on Wednesday. Rublev faces a blockbuster first-round match against former No. 3 in the world and 2020 Australian Open finalist Dominic Thiem.
Andy Murray features as the other pick of the round as he takes on 13th seed Matteo Berrettini. The Italian beat the three-time Grand Slam winner in four sets at the 2022 US Open and beat the Scot in three of their four ATP meetings.
Following the retirement of reigning champion Ashleigh Barty from tennis last year, Iga Światek has dominated the sport and enters the tournament as the top favourite. The Pole makes his debut against the German Jule Niemeier, but faces an interesting potential quarter-final clash with the great American promise Coco Gauff.
The 18-year-old superstar comes into the tournament in good shape, having won the ASB Classic without losing a set and is looking to build on her excellent 2022, in which she reached the final at Roland Garros, where she was defeated by Światek.
However, before any quarter-final clash with the favorite, Gauff faces a second-round match against 2021 US Open champion Emma Raducanu, who is in a race against time to recover from an injury to her back. ankle.
In the other half of the draw, second seed Ons Jabeur begins her 2023 trying to improve on last year and win a Grand Slam. The Tunisian reached the finals of Wimbledon and the US Open, but she fell at the final hurdle in her bid to become the first Arab and North African woman to win a Grand Slam.
After missing the 2022 Open, Jabeur opens her 2023 account against Tamara Zidanšek and could face Aryna Sabalenka, who has just won at Adelaide 1, the eleventh title of her career and the first in 19 months.
On the other hand, the American Jessica Pegula has been included in the same part of the draw as Maria Sakkari. Pegula recently led Team USA to victory in the inaugural United Cup, which featured a brilliant straight-sets victory over Światek. Having reached back-to-back quarter-finals in Melbourne and at the top of her game, she will look to set up an exciting semi-final with her United Cup opponent.
