The Laver Cup is a men’s tennis tournament featuring tennis players from Europe (Team Europe) who compete with players from the rest of the world (Team World). The tournament was first played in 2017. The Laver Cup has been compared to the Ryder Cup in golf which features a team of golf players from the United States playing against a team of European golfers. The Laver Cup is named after former Australian tennis great Rod Laver.
Team Captains and members
Team Europe and Team World compete in the Laver Cup. Each team is captained by a legend of the sport. The current captain for Team Europe is former Swedish player Bjorn Borg while Team World is captained by former American player John McEnroe. Both teams feature six players. Three of the six players qualify for selection based on the current ATP rankings as of the Monday following the French Open. The other three are picked by their respective captains and are announced by the start of the US Open.
Rules and format
The Laver Cup is played over a period of three days usually a weekend. On Friday and Saturdays, there are two sessions of play both during the day and at night. The event wraps up on Sunday with only a day session being played. Four matches are played each day, three singles and doubles.
Both singles and doubles are best of three matches and each competing player in the tournament plays at least one singles match during the first two days. Each match played at the event on Friday is worth one point, two points on Saturday, and three points on Sunday.
Out of a total of 24 points, the first team to reach 13 points wins the Laver Cup. In case of a tie at 12:12, a doubles match is played by the teams which acts as the decider. Line ups are announced at the end of activities of each day save for Friday line ups which are announced on Thursday afternoon.
Team Europe and Team World
The location of the Laver Cup rotates between Europe and the cities in the rest of the world. The 2019 Laver Cup will be played in Geneva, Switzerland on the weekend of 20th -22nd September.
Team Europe will feature tennis players Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer, Dominic Thiem, Alexander Zverev, Stefanos Tsitsipas, and Fabio Fognini. Roberto Bautista Agut will be the alternate.
Team World will feature Americans John Isner, Jack Sock, Taylor Fritz, Australian Nick Kyrgios and Canadians Milos Raonic and Denis Shapovalov. Team Europe has won all the previous editions of the Laver Cup in 2017 and 2018 and it is the hot favorite to also win this year. Jordan Thompson will be the alternate.
Rafael Nadal’s ranking and performance in 2019
Ranked no.2, the Spaniard played his last match on the 8th of September when he defeated Daniil Medvedev 7-5 6-3 5-7 4-6 6-4 in the final in U.S. Open to win his 84th career title.
This year Rafael has a 47-6 win-loss record. Rafael clinched 4 titles in 2019 in Rome, at the French Open, in Montreal and at the U.S. Open. The Spaniard was the finalist at the Australian Open.
Roger Federer’s ranking and performance in 2019
Ranked no.3, the Swiss played his last match on the 3rd of September when he lost to Grigor Dimitrov 3-6 6-4 3-6 6-4 6-2 in the quarter in U.S. Open.
This year Roger has a 43-7 win-loss record. The Swiss conquered 3 titles in 2019 in Dubai, in Miami and in Halle. Roger was the finalist in Indian Wells and in Wimbledon.
Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer played each other 42 times. The head to head is 26-16 for Nadal.
The last time that they competed against each other, Roger Federer won 7-63 1-6 6-3 6-4 in the semifinal in London in 12th July 2019.
Here the highlights.
Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer |
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