When Alex de Minaur discovered concerning the United Cup launching in Australia this summer season, he didn’t should suppose twice about signing up. “For me, there isn’t any larger honour than to symbolize your nation,” the World No. 24 mentioned.
“It’s one other probability, one other alternative to do every thing I can to hopefully get a win for Australia. I’ll be certain that I’m able to go and able to give it my all.”
De Minaur acquired an early take a look at circumstances on Ken Rosewall Enviornment throughout a apply session underneath the watchful eye of Tony Roche on Friday.
Australia has landed in a powerful Group D, alongside Spain and Nice Britain, for the round-robin stage of the blended crew occasion. “It’s going to be nice for us to actually check ourselves and have nice matches earlier than the Australian Open,” mentioned De Minaur, who gained a career-high 47 singles matches this season. It’s going to be robust, however we like being the underdogs. Hopefully we will push one another, have one another’s backs, come out with some nice tennis and do Australia proud.”
Australia carried out strongly in crew competitions throughout 2022, reaching the finals of each the Billie Jean King Cup and Davis Cup for the primary time in nearly three a long time. De Minaur believes these outcomes show that Australia is a United Cup contender.
“(Now we have) proven how robust we’re, how a lot it means to play for Australia and the way a lot delight we’ve got in representing the inexperienced and gold,” he mentioned. “We’d not have folks within the high 20, however we’re nonetheless on the market making finals in each Billie Jean King Cup and the Davis Cup.”
De Minaur can also be thrilled that the Australian crew is competing in his delivery metropolis of Sydney. “I’m trying ahead to being again in Sydney, again on the courts I grew up on. It is going to be good to play in entrance of an Aussie crowd once more,” mentioned the 23-year-old.
“To get the prospect to symbolize our nation right here at house in Australia goes to be nice. It could clearly imply lots if we will do some harm and take house the title, particularly in entrance of our house crowd.”
De Minaur admits there are some nerves concerning the prospect of enjoying blended doubles. “That may undoubtedly be a brand new factor for me. I’d be doubtlessly making my debut on the blended doubles court docket,” he defined. “Who is aware of if that can occur? We’ve acquired a variety of nice choices on the crew, so we’ll maintain our opponents guessing till the final second.”
No matter whether or not he’s chosen to play blended doubles or not, De Minaur is worked up to hitch Australia’s top-ranked ladies in a crew setting for the primary time.
“It ought to be a variety of enjoyable,” he mentioned. “Us Aussies have a tendency to stay collectively all year long anyway. This can be an excellent greater probability for us to have one another’s backs and actually be a tight-knit group. I feel that’s the entire foundation for a crew to do properly, so we’ll undoubtedly be very robust within the crew chemistry side.”
