When you have Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal in your team, you have arguably two of the greatest tennis players of all time. Between them, they have won 31 Grand Slams. So for Team Europe, it is a definite win-win.
Federer and Nadal have committed to playing for Europe in the inaugural tennis Laver Cup which will see the best tennis players from Europe and the rest of the world compete in a Ryder Cup-style competition. The inaugural edition will be played from September 22 to 24 in 2017, at the O2 Arena in Prague. The three-day tournament will be scheduled two weeks after the US Open each year. There will be four matches each day — three in singles, one in doubles — and each player must play at least one singles rubber. The tournament, named after former Australian great Rod Laver who won 11 major titles, will rotate between major cities across the globe.
Former World No. 1 and a legend in his own right, Bjorn Borg from Sweden will serve as Europe’s captain and the international squad, The World, will be coached by American tennis legend John McEnroe. Europe and The World will each feature six players on their rosters. Borg and McEnroe will name two players to their squads, while the remaining four will automatically qualify based on their Association of Tennis Professionals rankings.
Europe have a potentially dream line-up of Novak Djokovic (Serbia), Andy Murray (Scotland), Federer (Switzerland), Nadal (Spain), Stan Wawrinka (Switzerland) and Tomas Berdych (Czech Republic). McEnroe on current rankings would have Milos Raonic (Canada), Kei Nishikori (Japan), Nick Kyrgios (Australia), Bernard Tomic (Australia), along with two captain's picks.
The top five players currently in the ATP rankings are Europeans, as are 13 of the top 15. Only one active non-European men’s player, Argentina’s Juan Martin del Potro, has won a Grand Slam title.