New tournament from ATP and WTA. Without Russia and Belarus

Tennis Australia, ATP and WTA will be organizers United Cup – A new annual team tournament that will open the tennis season in 2023.

The tournament will feature mixed teams from 18 countries and matches will take place from 29 December 2022 to 8 January 2023 in Brisbane, Perth and Sydney.

These competitions will replace the men’s ATP Cup on the tennis calendar and have a prize pool of US$15 million. Tournament participants will also receive a maximum of 500 ATP and WTA ranking points each.

Currently, the first details of the new tournament format are known:

• the top 12 nations will be selected based on the six highest ranked ATP and WTA players;
• the remaining six teams will qualify based on the best overall ranking of men and women from each country;
• the host country, Australia, is guaranteed participation in the competition, either by ranking or as a wild card;
• each team has up to four men and up to four women;
• each city will host two groups of three countries;
• each match will consist of two men’s and two women’s singles matches and one mixed doubles match;
• group winners in each city will compete for one of three places in the Final Four (semi-finals);
• The three winners of each city will advance to the final four, with another team from the playoffs top teams joining them.

The draw for the Unified Cup, which will determine 18 teams, will take place on 10 December.

It was noted that due to the military occupation of Ukraine, the national teams of Russia and Belarus will not be allowed to participate in this tournament.

Earlier, the prize fund of the Final Women’s Tournament was revealed.