ATP Cup: Thomas Muster is Austria's team captain
Now it is fixed: The former world ranking first in tennis and so far only single Grand Slam winner from Austria, Thomas Muster, will act as captain for the red-white-red team at the new ATP Cup. This emerges from an invitation to a media meeting at the ATP Finals in London .
by APA / tennisnet
last edit: Nov 13, 2019, 07:41 pm
From 3 January 2020, the new team competition in Australia will take place in Sydney, Brisbane and Perth. Austria is also represented at the premiere thanks to Dominic Thiem's top ten status. Thiem had pronounced himself the number 1 of his country for the 52-year-old Styrian pattern as a preferred candidate.
On Thursday, the draw takes place in Melbourne. With Muster, Boris Becker (GER) and Marat Safin (RUS), three former number 1 players will take on as captains to the opponents and the new Cup.
The game will be played with 24 nations in six groups of four for a total of eight places in the quarter-finals. Then it continues in the knock-out system with quarter-finals, semi-finals and finals. Up to five players can be nominated in each team, each international match consists of two singles and a double. The main criterion for the qualification is the ranking of the best placed player in each country.
Unlike the traditional Davis Cup hosted by the International Tennis Federation (ITF), points are also awarded to the ATP Cup for the ranking. In the ten days is about 750 ATP counters, also the competition is endowed with 15 million dollars.
Thomas Muster watches Dominic Thiem training
While Thiem's coach Nicolas Massu has already left the ATP finals on Wednesday, Muster stopped by his training with brother Moritz. Massu traveled to Madrid, where he prepared his team in the role of Davis Cup captain for the first edition of the finals.
Meanwhile, Wolfgang Thiem and physiotherapist Alex Stober and fitness coach Duglas Cordero stayed in London. However, Muster was a guest on light practice on Wednesday. Thiem spooled a gentle unit, as he struggles with a cold, as father Wolfgang confirmed in tennisnet interview .