World No. 1 Ashleigh Barty will lead Australia's largest Olympic tennis squad at next month's Tokyo Games.
The 25-year-old Barty will go for gold in her Olympic debut leading an 11-player team that features fellow major champion Samantha Stosur, who will make history as the first Australian tennis player to play five Olympics.
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“It’s super special being able to represent your country in one Olympics, let alone five,” Stosur said. “I can’t believe I’m still going at this point in time, but thankfully I was able to keep going and make it between London and Tokyo which I didn’t ever think was going to be on the cards.
“In primary school we did a time capsule. I went to the school for the first year that it opened, and I wrote in there that I wanted to win a Grand Slam, be No.1 in the world and go to an Olympic Games. To have done two out of the three, thinking that when I was nine or 10 years old, who would’ve thought, is something incredible.”
Ajla Tomljanovic joins Barty and Stosur as an Australian singles starter. In doubles, Barty is set to partner Storm Sanders with Stosur playing alongside Ellen Perez.
World No. 15 Alex de Minaur, who lost his Wimbledon opener to Sebastian Korda today, former Wimbledon quarterfinalist Nick Kyrgios, John Millman and James Duckworth are the Australian men's singles starters. Millman will join forces with Luke Saville and John Peers will partner De Minaur in men’s doubles.
Eight of Australia's 11 players are Olympic debutants with Millman and Peers playing their second Olympics following the 2016 Rio Games.
Several Grand Slam champions including Rafael Nadal, Serena Williams, Simona Halep, Dominic Thiem and Stan Wawrkina will not play the Tokyo Olympics set for July 23rd-August 8th.
Photo credit: Mark Peterson/Corleve