Americans Jessica Pegula, Taylor Fritz Return to Defend Title
they Won as U.S. Leaders During Inaugural Event Last Year
Australia-Based International Team Tournament Features World No. 1 Novak Djokovic
LOS ANGELES, Dec. 27, 2023 – Tennis Channel will have exclusive, live coverage of the second annual United Cup competition December 28-January 7, the first event of the 2024 tennis season. Held in the Australian cities of Perth and Sydney, the tournament features 18 national teams of men’s and women’s players. Among them are Americans Jessica Pegula (World No. 4 singles) and Taylor Fritz (No. 10 singles), who led the United States to the inaugural championship last January and are back to help their country defend its title. Others include World No. 1 men’s singles star Novak Djokovic and World No. 2 women’s singles champion Iga Swiatek. Tennis Channel’s coverage gets underway Thursday, Dec. 28, at 9 p.m. ET, with a round-robin match between Brazil and Spain.
Introduced last year, the United Cup begins with round-robin play before concluding with single-elimination quarterfinals, semifinals and the final. During group stage six pools of three countries feature two head-to-head matchups for every team. The six group winners advance to the quarterfinals, joined by the two best second-place teams. Each head-to-head matchup between nations consists of a men’s and women’s singles match followed by a mixed-doubles contest. Winning two of three secures victory. The top ranked singles players for each country will compete in singles matches, ensuring star-laden battles to begin the new season with a clash of tennis heavyweights.
Led by Pegula and Fritz, the United States defeated Italy in the 2023 United Cup Final. This year the team will be based in Perth and play Britain Saturday, Dec. 30, at 9 p.m. ET. The Americans’ second match is against Australia on Monday, Jan. 1, at 4 a.m. ET.
Tennis Channel’s United Cup coverage typically gets underway at 6 p.m. or 6:30 p.m. ET each evening, running through the late night and into the following morning (daily schedules can be found at https://tennischannel.com/schedule). Semifinals take place Friday, Jan. 5, at 9:30 p.m. ET, and Saturday, Jan. 6, at 4:30 a.m. ET. The United Cup final will be held Sunday, Jan. 7, at 4:30 a.m. ET. Tennis Channel’s second network, T2, and streaming service, Tennis Channel Plus, will also carry live United Cup matches again this year. The channel’s international platforms will carry the event in Austria, Germany, India, Spain, Switzerland and the United Kingdom as well.
Former players Jason Goodall, Chanda Rubin (@Chanda_Rubin), Paul Annacone (@paul_annacone) and Coco Vandeweghe (@CocoVandey) will be on air for Tennis Channel during the United Cup this year. Goodall and Rubin will announce matches, with Annacone and Vandeweghe offering analysis.
Pegula and Fritz headline an American roster that includes 2023 US Open doubles-champion Rajiv Ram along with Denis Kudla, Alycia Parks and Desirae Krawczyk.
With Djokovic (Serbia) and Swiatek (Poland), top-ranked tennis stars competing in the United Cup this year are Stefanos Tsitsipas (Greece), Maria Sakkari (Greece), Alexander Zverev (Germany), Caroline Garcia (France) and Casper Ruud (Norway).
The 2024 tournament features Australia, Brazil, Britain, Canada, Chile, China, Croatia, Czech Rep., France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Serbia, Spain and the United States.
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