Melbourne: Officials announced on Friday that Naomi Osaka and Rafael Nadal will begin their Australian Open preparations in Melbourne while Ashleigh Barty will return to action for the first time in four months in January in Adelaide.
Nadal has decided to forego the ATP Cup 2022 in favour of a low-key preparation in Melbourne, where he will be joined by former world number three Grigor Dimitrov. He wants to return to tennis later this month at an Abu Dhabi exhibition before heading to Australia, where all players must be properly vaccinated against coronavirus.
Osaka, the defending Australian Open champion who has dropped to number 13 in the world, will compete in the Melbourne Summer Set event, which will take place from January 3 to 9, and will feature both women’s and men’s divisions.
Emma Raducanu, the US Open winner, will join her, although her form has dipped since her surprising victory at Flushing Meadows.
Simona Halep, Elise Mertens, and Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, the top-ranked player in the world, are among the other players scheduled to compete in Melbourne.
US great Serena Williams, who is marooned on 23 Grand Slam titles — one short of the all-time record held by Margaret Court — has pulled out of the Australian summer, saying she was not “where I need to be physically”.
Barty hasn’t competed since a shocking third-round loss at the US Open in September, but she still closed 2021 as the world number one after winning five tournaments. The reigning Wimbledon winner leads an Adelaide International lineup that includes nine of the top ten women in the globe, including defending champion Iga Swiatek.
Former world number one Garbine Muguruza, Karolina Pliskova, and Victoria Azarenka, as well as world number two Aryna Sabalenka, are all registered for the January 2-9 event.
Only seventh-ranked Estonian Anett Kontaveit will be absent from the top ten in Adelaide.
