Once a year, professional tennis sets aside its usual every-man-for-himself format for something different. The Laver Cup brings together some of the sport’s biggest names not to compete individually, but as part of two continental squads: Team Europe versus Team World. The result is a hybrid of fierce competition and genuine camaraderie rarely seen on the Grand Slam circuit.
The tournament borrows its team-based concept from golf’s Ryder Cup, which similarly divides players by continent rather than nationality. It was Roger Federer, the Swiss tennis legend, who first dreamed up the idea, later joined by Brazilian billionaire Jorge Paulo Lemann and the organization Tennis Australia. Rather than naming the event after a current star, Federer chose to honor Rod Laver, the Australian great who remains the only man in history to win the calendar-year Grand Slam twice, first in 1962 and again in 1969.
Prague hosted the inaugural edition in 2017, and the tournament has since traveled between European and North American cities, pausing only in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Curious about the scoring system, this year’s rosters, and where the next edition will be played? You can find the full details in the original Spanish-language article from Excélsior.
Source: <![CDATA[¿Qué es y cómo se juega la Laver Cup? Todo lo que debes saber de este torneo de tenis]]> (RSS::excelsior.com.mx – Portada).
Image: प्रतीक, BY 2.0 (via Openverse).