Australian Open 2022 – When and Where?

The 110th Australian Open (54th in the open era) will take place in Melbourne, Australia, on the courts of the Melbourne Park sports complex. The tournament draw calendar takes two weeks, as tradition demands: the Australian Open 2022 will be held from 17 to 30 January 2022. Despite the epidemiological difficulties, the qualifying tournament, unlike last year, will take place in Melbourne.

It has to be noted that the Australian Open has historically been held in six different cities and two countries. In addition to quite familiar and welcoming Melbourne, AO was held in Sydney 17 times, in Adelaide 14 times, in Brisbane 7 times, three times in Perth, and twice in New Zealand, back in 1906 and 1912.

Australian Open 2022 will feature competitions in five different categories: men's and women's singles and three doubles: women's, men's, and mixed. As in previous seasons, 128 athletes will take part in the main draw of singles and 64 duets will play in doubles. In all categories, the Olympic system is used, which means an athlete (or a duet) is eliminated from the draw immediately after the defeat.

At the 54th Australian Open, the main tournament has a two-week schedule. In the first week (from January 17 to January 23), 1/64, 1/32 and 1/16 finals games are held in singles. If the weather won’t get any worse and the providers won’t be running out of time, then some or all of the 1/8 final games will be successfully held. In the second week (from January 24 to January 30), games of the late stages will be played in all categories, including doubles. On the final two days of the draw, the final games will be held on the main court of Melbourne Park - the Rod Laver Arena.

Live coverage of all Australian Open games will be available on Eurosport 1 and Eurosport 2 TV channels, available for an additional fee from digital and cable TV operators, as well as through a paid subscription on the Eurosport Player platform.

Eight of the strongest tennis players in the world according to the ATP were originally announced for the Australian Open in men's singles, including Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal. However, the world No. 1 and the most successful AO tennis player in the history of the tournament will ultimately be unable to take part in the draw, since the Australian authorities canceled his visa due to COVID restrictions, despite a court decision in his favor. Rafael Nadal, after a long recovery period, before AO took part in the Summer Set tournament, and eventually became the winner.

The strongest Russian tennis players - Daniil Medvedev, Andrei Rublev, and Karaen Khachanov will also take part in the draw. In the women's tournament, all the strongest players will take part, including local favourite Ashleigh Barty, who has not yet won a home tournament, and last year's winner Naomi Osaka, who has finally solved her psychological problems.

In the men's singles in 2021, Novak Djokovic, the world number one and the most titled AO tennis player in history, celebrated his victory. In the final, Novak defeated Daniil Medvedev, now the second racket of the world, in three sets. Overall, the Serbian has won the Australian Open in singles nine times.

In 2021, in the women's singles, Naomi Osaka, now the 14th racket of the world, celebrated her victory for the second time in her career. A year ago, in the final, the Japanese confidently, in straight sets, defeated the American Jennifer Brady with a score of 6:4, 6:3. Prior to that, Osaka took the title in Melbourne in 2019, beating Petra Kvitova in the decisive match. In 2020, American Sofia Kenin and Spaniard Garbine Muguruza played in the final of the women's singles tournament. The Pyrenean turned out to be weaker, losing to the US representative in three games.

The men's pair in 2021 was won by the duet Ivan Dodig (Croatia) / Filip Polasek (Slovakia). In the women's doubles, the victory was celebrated by the international couple Elise Mertens (Belgium) / Arina Sabalenka (Belarus). In the mixed category, Barbora Kreychikova (Czech Republic) / Rajiv Ram (USA) excelled.

After the deportation of Djokovic, the list of the main contenders for the Australian crown, according to 1xBet experts, looks like this:

Since Novak Djokovic will not be able to take part in the upcoming tournament, then Daniil Medvedev, as the finalist of the last AO draw, is quite logically the main favourite. The first racket of Russia won the Major in the USA last season and reached the AO final. Obviously, Daniil has very few equal competitors across the world. In addition, despite a very short off-season, Medvedev is in great shape. At least at the ATP Cup-2022 in Sydney, Daniil showed a very high level of playing, thanks to which the weakened Russian team reached the semi-finals of the draw and was very close to the final.

In 2021, Alexander Zverev won five tournaments, including the Final in Turin, when he defeated Daniil Medvedev. In the absence of Novak, it is Zverev who should become Daniil's main competitor in the fight for the title. The German in Sydney did not play as brightly as the Russian. For example, Zverev lost in three sets to Auger-Aliassime, a Canadian, whom Medvedev tritely did not notice in the semifinals, having outplayed him in two games 6:4, 6:0. We should not forget that AO is a long tournament, and top performers usually get in shape in two weeks.

In 2021, Rafael Nadal did not win a single tournament since 2003. And the last time we saw the Spaniard at the official competition was only at the beginning of August in Washington. But Rafael started 2022 on a positive note, taking the title in the Melbourne Summer Set. However, even this not quite a status competition showed that he is still far from optimal form. This conclusion follows from the fact that in the final of the Summer Set, Nadal had problems with the little-known American Maxim Cressy, the 112th racket of the world. But, despite the long downtime and not the best current tone, bookmakers put the Spaniard in third place in the chart of likely winners of AO-2022.

In women's tennis, making predictions for the winner is a very difficult task. Not only do girls have higher competition than men, especially at major tournaments, it is also difficult to guess the shape of a particular performer over such a long distance as two weeks of the draw. Despite all this, 1xBet issued the following verdict about the favourites of AO-2022:

Despite the fact that Ashleigh Barty has never won a home Major yet, it is quite logical to see the Australian as the main contender for the title. Barty, whatever one may say, is the first racket of the world. In addition, Ashley can be called a profile player on hard surfaces. Most of the tournaments she's won in her career have been on hard surface, including Cincinnati and Miami in 2021. Moreover, already in 2022, Barty once again won the competition in Adelaide, beating Iga Swiatek, one of her main competitors in Melbourne, in the final.

Two-time AO winner and current title holder Naomi Osaka. It’s a little strange, but the Japanese won nothing else in 2021, except for the Australian Open. However, this should not be too surprising, because Naomi is famous for the fact that she knows how to perfectly prepare for major tournaments. In addition to two titles in Melbourne, Osaka has won two US Opens, as well as major tournaments in Indian Wells and Beijing. Another thing is that the Japanese has some health problems (including mental ones), because Naomi completed last season in September. And already in 2022, at the Summer Set 1 tournament, Osaka, after victories over Kornet, Zanevskaya, and Petkovic, did not enter the court against Kudermetova, citing an injury.

It's somewhat surprising to see Emma Raducanu as one of the favorites for such a major tournament as the Australian Open. Yes, she confidently won the US Open last year, but do not forget that the Briton is only 19 years old, that is, Emma is only learning stability. And after the US Open-2021, only failures awaited Raducanu. In Indian Wells, the British lost to Sasnovich in the first game, and in the Romanian Cluj-Napoca, Emma turned out to be stronger than Herzog and Bogdan, but weaker than the Ukrainian Kostyuk. In 2022, Emma did not play a single set on the pro court, which is also a minus for the bets on the promising representative of the UK.

The total prize pool for the Australian Open will be AU$75 million, or approximately US$54 million, almost 5% more than in 2021. In many ways, the increase in the prize fund is due to the fact that this time the organizers allowed the audience to be present in the stands. Moreover, almost 100% turnout is expected, which should offset all planned financial costs.