Fourteen-time Grand Slam champion Rafael Nadal will commence his season in Australia for the first time when he joins the field at Brisbane International presented by Suncorp this summer.

The Spanish ace has traditionally favoured the Middle East to start his new year campaign, but will break with tradition in January for his maiden appearance in the Sunshine State.

“It’s going to be the first time in my career that I’m going to play in Australia the first week of the season and I’m really excited about it,” Nadal said.

“I think this is something I have to do during my career and I think at the same time it’s going to be a great preparation to be in Australia early. Everybody who has been in Brisbane has told me very beautiful things about the tournament and the place so I want to try it.”

Nadal completes a clean sweep of the ‘Big Four’ to step out at Pat Rafter Arena, with fellow men’s tennis stars Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray all having competed at previous editions of the event.

Brisbane International Tournament Director Geoff Quinlan said the World No.5 would be a sure-fire favourite with fans this summer.

“We’re thrilled to announce Rafael Nadal will start his season in Brisbane in 2017 and can’t wait to welcome him to Queensland Tennis Centre,” he said.

“The Brisbane International has a reputation for attracting the biggest names in world tennis and we’re really excited our fans will have the chance to see Rafa in action this summer. We’ve been in talks with Rafa for a number of years about competing in Brisbane, he’s seen the event get bigger and better every year and we’re ecstatic he’s decided to join the field in 2017.

“Rafa is a legend of the sport and one of the most exciting players to see live so I’m sure fans will be counting down the days to January.

“This is just the start of a very exciting line-up of players we will announce over the coming months as we look ahead to Brisbane International 2017.”

Minister for Tourism and Major Events Kate Jones said securing Nadal was a win for the tournament and Queensland tourism.

“In 2016 we welcomed legend Roger Federer for a third time, and it’s fantastic to now add Rafa to the list of champions to play in Queensland’s premier tennis tournament,” Minister Jones said.

“Securing marquee players like Rafael Nadal provides a big drawcard for the Brisbane International and boosts the reputation of this world class Queensland event.”

Brisbane International 2017, presented by Suncorp and supported by Tourism and Events Queensland, will be held at Queensland Tennis Centre from 1 to 8 January. The tournament is part of the Emirates Australian Open Series, which also incorporates Hopman Cup (Perth), Apia International Sydney, Hobart International and World Tennis Challenge (Adelaide).

Pre-sale tickets are on sale to registered players through Ticketek from midday today.

For all tournament information please visit brisbaneinternational.com.au.

On 8 June, it would have been hard to believe Steve Johnson would be celebrating a lifelong dream this week at the Winston-Salem Open.

In ‘s-Hertogenbosch, he had just lost to 17-year-old countryman Stefan Kozlov 6-3, 6-4 in 87 minutes. A day earlier, the young American had won his first ever ATP World Tour match.

“Not my best match of the year by any stretch,” Johnson said earlier this week in Winston-Salem.

But the 26 year old didn’t let the defeat derail his season. In fact, the next week, he celebrated a career-high win: Johnson beat then-No. 10 Richard Gasquet at The Queen’s Club to gain the first Top 10 win of his career. Beginning with that result, he’s gone 20-7 in tour-level matches.

On Monday, he celebrated his biggest accomplishment yet. Johnson, No. 21 in the Emirates ATP Rankings, officially became the No. 1 American. John Isner had reigned at the top every week since 29 July, 2013.

“It’s easy to pinpoint now that was the turning point to my season,” Johnson said of the Gasquet match. “Even at that point, deep down I believed that I still was capable of this. Maybe there are doubts that creep in but thank goodness I have people who are close to me who never doubted me. They just continued to push me and that’s what you need when times are tough.”

It has been quite the past few months for Johnson. After reaching the quarter-finals at The Queen’s Club, he won his first ATP World Tour singles title at the Aegon Open Nottingham (d. Cuevas). At Wimbledon the next week, he reached the fourth round of a Grand Slam championship for the first time (l. to Federer).

In Washington, Johnson beat Isner in the quarter-finals before falling to Ivo Karlovic in the semi-finals. The California native also reached his first ATP World Tour Masters 1000 quarter-final last week at the Western & Southern Open (l. to Dimitrov).

Johnson started the season 6-14. “That’s why you have to stay positive. It can turn around at any moment,” he said.

In Winston-Salem, he’ll trying to continue his “year of firsts” and win his first title on American soil. He has come close to making the final of a U.S. tournament. Johnson has reached the semi-finals in Washington twice and made the last four in Winston-Salem last year.

But the two-time NCAA singles champion at the University of Southern California said he feels especially comfortable playing at the Winston-Salem Open, which is held at Wake Forest University.

“You want to win on American soil as much as possible,” Johnson said. “It would be fun to win obviously one of our, what we consider our home tournaments so hopefully I’ll get a chance to be here at the end of the week.”

It was a match a less poised young player might have lost.

On Monday at the Winston-Salem Open, 21 year old Kyle Edmund faced ATP World Tour veteran Rajeev Ram for a spot in the second round. The 32 year old’s serve-and-volley tactics and flat, penetrating groundstrokes thrive in quick environments like Winston-Salem.

In similar conditions last month at the Rogers Cup, the American’s unique style helped him beat rising Frenchman Lucas Pouille and reach the third round.

But in North Carolina, Edmund was able to break Ram three times. After losing two match points, the young Brit advanced 7-5, 7-6(5).

“I just knew I had to keep going because I was playing well to get match points,” Edmund told ATPWorldTour.com. “There’s no point in moping around because if you mope around you get a slow start in the tie-break and that will cost you and then you’re in the third set anyway.”

The win was the #NextGen star’s first at the ATP World Tour 250 tournament and the latest sign of his continued development. Since the start of 2015, the 6’2” right-hander has hiked 106 spots in the Emirates ATP Rankings to No. 85.

He’s spent the season checking off career milestones. He reached his first ATP World Tour quarter-final in Doha (l. to Berdych). At The Queen’s Club in London, he made his second ATP World Tour quarter-final (l. to Murray) and gained his first Top 20 win, beating then-World No. 18 Gilles Simon 6-4, 3-6, 6-1.

Twelve months ago this week, Edmund had finished playing an ATP Challenger event and was playing qualifying at the US Open.

“If I look at this stage last year and I say am I a better player? I say definitely,” Edmund said. “I’ve played more matches on the bigger stages at the tour level… So you’re building that experience in the bank, which is good for me and that’s exactly what I want.”

Edmund has made a conscious effort this year to play more ATP World Tour tournaments and fewer Challenger events. The choice has helped him gain experience against the best in the world.

In March at the Miami Open presented by Itau, the Beverley resident faced World No. 1 Novak Djokovic in the second round but fell 6-3, 6-3. In the quarter-finals of the Aegon Championships in June, the Brit showed his improved game by taking a set off World No. 2 Andy Murray before losing to his countryman 6-4, 3-6, 6-1.

“I was pleased with what I put on court [against Murray],” Edmund said. “What you take away from that is, what we’re doing is good, but let’s do it more consistently. Step it up a level.”

Murray, who’d go on to win a record fifth Aegon Championships title, noted Edmund’s evolving game after the match.

“When he’s landing first serves and then getting the first shot of the rally on his forehand, he can dictate a lot of the points,” Murray said. “He doesn’t have a real weakness from the back. His backhand is solid… There are obviously things he’s going to continue to improve as well… I think his game is getting better all the time, and that’s very positive.”

At Winston-Salem, which is held at Wake Forest University, Edmund is looking to keep improving and enjoy another college campus in the U.S. While he was in the Dallas area for the Irving Challenger in February, he trained with the Texas Christian University men’s tennis team in Fort Worth.

“It’s always individual stuff here. To go there and work with the team is slightly different but it’s a nice difference so it’s good,” Edmund said.

He especially had fun during their off-court activity of paintballing. Edmund had never been before and learned how intense the game can get.

“We played teams, you win some you lose some. But everyone comes away with bruises, don’t they?” he said. “I put on the mask but I remember I got one right in the mouth vent. I just remembered this massive noise, and I didn’t know what happened. I knew I got hit. I went back and all my teeth were pink from the ball.”

Maybe in Winston-Salem he’ll stick to tennis.

A lot can change in two years. In 2014, Grigor Dimitrov, looked to have begun to realise his potential as he surged into the Top 10 after reaching his first Grand Slam semi-final at Wimbledon. But success proved fleeting; Dimitrov was far from the finished article.

However, a journey of self-discovery over the past 18 months looks to have led the Bulgarian to finding his own identity, and with it, a sense of calm and happiness once more on the tennis court.

“The one thing I’ve been really focused on is simplicity and just being me,” Dimitrov told ATPWorldTour.com. “I’ve been finding my identity not only on the court, but also off the court. I have so many different interests in so many different areas that sometimes I just need to chill, step back and let it be. Wake up and do whatever I feel like and the way I want to do it and live a little bit more on my own terms.”

A new partnership this summer with Dani Vallverdu – former coach of Andy Murray and Tomas Berdych – has further cemented in Dimitrov’s mind the need for simplicity in his life and getting back to basics on the tennis court.

“Now that I’m working with Dani it’s also nice to have someone you can really get close to and share a lot,” said Dimitrov. “The structure overall has been better for me. We’re simplifying things, working on the right things and that in a way helps you to become a little bit calmer, more confident and that brings a lot to your game.

“Lately we’ve been doing a lot of work, even after matches, working on small details, whether it’s backhand cross or backhand down the line or certain go-to game plays in certain moments to try and make everything a little bit more automatic and lose yourself in the game. It’s great when you start feeling that you’re hitting the ball well and there’s nothing else but the ball and the way you move and the way you hit it. You enjoy the game way more.”

Total immersion in his game has brought Dimitrov and Vallverdu instant results. When the pair joined forces, Dimitrov was World No. 40 in the Emirates ATP Rankings, his lowest position in more than three years. He is now on the verge of returning to the Top 20 after reaching the quarter-finals of the Rogers Cup in Toronto (l. to Nishikori) and the semi-finals of the Western & Southern Open in Cincinnati (l. to Cilic).

For a player blessed with immense talent, the challenge has been understanding his best game and how best to use his range of shots.

“He’s determined to play the best tennis he can,” Vallverdu told ATPWorldTour.com. “During the past year he’s been struggling to find his own identity; he didn’t know which kind of player he was.

“My goal is helping him with this and simplifying his tennis. He has lots of variety, but he only needs those resources when he is facing difficult situations on court. When he’s not in a difficult moment, it’s important that he only concentrates on his main weapons, which are really good. That’s what I’m going to try and implement in his game: simplifying it as much as possible. We want him to feel comfortable with his weapons.”

“We had a good start,” continued Vallverdu. “Since Toronto things have been going well. But it’s not going to be a process of one or two months. It will be a process of six to 12 months.

“The most important thing in the next three months is to start establishing good habits on the court. Habits that will make him competitive next year. That’s what I want, for him to be very consistent every day so that the habits develop as much as possible. It’s not easy. It will be a tough mental process. But it’s a process I’m certain he has to go through.”

Vallverdu’s assessment of Dimitrov’s career path was simply that success came too early for a player already burdened with the pressure of being ‘the next Roger Federer’.

“Many players who manage to reach the Top 10 at a young age struggle to understand what’s happening,” he said. “It’s a brand new situation for them, as much off the court as on it. I think the problem was that he was trying to find his identity on the court and he didn’t manage it.

“His weapons were not as good anymore. Then it’s like a domino effect: when your shots are not working, your confidence drops and the errors increase. He went through this process, but the important thing is to accept it and focus on the current moment. What’s good is that we know he is a player that can reach that level. It requires hard work, months of training, and he will have to give everything. But I’m convinced that with hard work he can play at a great level next season.”

“I’m definitely in a better spot [than last year],” said Dimitrov, remembering the doubts and periods of feeling low he struggled with during difficult moments in 2015. “I’ve been playing a little bit better tennis and had quite a few big wins so far.

“Overall I’m happy with the way things are developing. Of course, there’s more homework to be done. But right now I think I’m on the right path and just taking each day as it is and trying to enjoy a bit more every match that I’m playing out there.

“It’s a new chapter. I don’t feel like I’ve reached my potential. Of course I was Top 10, but that was momentary. I want to establish myself as one of those players. I’ve been there, done that, so I know what to do. My body feels excellent, I’m working hard, I’m developing my game, working in the gym and all these things are adding up. I think maturity also comes with that. I just need to get the results.”

“We have a long-term relationship in mind,” concluded Vallverdu. “I accepted the job because I see it as a long-term project. I firmly believe in Grigor and with a lot of hard work, we can achieve several goals. I’m ready to be working with him for a long time.”

As a kid in Nice, Gilles Simon had great tennis skills but he kept hearing why he wouldn’t make it as a pro.

Too skinny. Too short.

“He plays OK but he’s too small,” Simon remembers people saying.

But when he was about 10 years old, Simon saw a player who helped him believe those doubters were wrong. The player wasn’t particularly big nor particularly strong. He also didn’t try to outhit his opponents, opting instead to out-hustle and outsmart them. The American would chase down every ball and place his serve against his opponent’s weakness.

Michael Chang would go on to win 34 tour-level titles, including Simon’s home Grand Slam championship, Roland Garros, and reach No. 2 in the Emirates ATP Rankings. He also helped Simon believe that he had a future in tennis.

“It helps a lot when you can see a player like him on the court doing so well, playing smartly, being crafty… trying to use his weapons at the maximum level,” Simon told ATPWorldTour.com. “You realise he can do very good things… and it helped me to believe that I could make it also.”

Twenty years later, Simon has more than proved the naysayers wrong. At 6’0”, 154 pounds, he’s hardly the tallest or the biggest ATP World Tour player. Yet few have been as consistent as Simon during the past 15 years.

The right-hander has won 12 ATP World Tour titles and nearly $11 million in prize money. By the end of the season, he could secure his 400^th tour-level match win.

“In tennis, you can play with every type of physique,” he said.

The Frenchman also has won at least one title in eight of the past nine years. He hopes to add another year to that streak this week at the Winston-Salem Open.

Read More: On Seventh Attempt, Fritz Beats Tiafoe In Winston-Salem

Last year as the No. 1 seed, Simon had match point in the third set but lost to Brit Aljaz Bedene 6-7(5), 7-6(5), 7-6(6) in the second round.

This year, Simon came to Winston-Salem early to try to get more acclimated to the fast and hot conditions. He arrived here last Thursday and has spent more than three hours on court every day sweating and trying to adapt his flat, baseline game to the quick hard courts.

“For me, I hate to miss, and here you are missing. It’s really hard. The balls are flying,” he said. “I realise I’m struggling a bit here, so that’s why I took the chance to come early and to practise hard and I see already a lot improvement.”

At 31, Simon is firmly in the second half of his career. But his workmanlike style won’t end when he decides to retire. He enjoys watching Belgian David Goffin, 5’11”, 150 pounds; and Japanese Kei Nishikori, 5’10”, 165 pounds. They, like Simon, have had to find success differently than most.

“Nishikori, Goffin they are not mountains,” Simon said, “but they are quite good.”

You could say the same for Simon.

In a meeting of 18-year-old American NextGen stars Monday at the Winston-Salem Open, Taylor Fritz finally got the better of Frances Tiafoe, clinching a 6-1, 6-4 victory.

“I thought I played a really great match from start to finish,” he said. “I didn’t let it get too nervy, which I might have been afraid of closing the match out against him because I never beat him before and I really wanted to so badly. I’m glad with how everything went.”

Fritz had lost to Tiafoe in the six previous meetings of their rivalry – five at the junior level from 2011-14, followed by their first tour-level clash at the BNP Paribas Open earlier this year. On Monday, he capitalised on three of his five break point chances en route to a 63-minute win.

“When I played him in Indian Wells I was thinking about it too much,” he said. “I wanted it way too bad and that just caused me to play a really tight and nervy match. This time I came out with no expectations, not feeling like I should win, not feeling entitled at all to winning the match, and I think that’s what allowed me to play loose and play free and play a good match.”

Fritz, currently a career-high World No. 54, has climbed more than 600 places in the Emirates ATP Rankings in a year and is a lead candidate to be named the 2016 ATP Star Of Tomorrow presented by Emirates. Tiafoe, who claimed his first tour-level win last year as a qualifier in Winston-Salem, has risen 150 spots to No. 124.

“Frances and I were actually talking about that before the match, that it’s crazy where we are right now,” said Fritz. “Neither of us thought we’d be where we are right now, a year later.

“I think this whole group has transitioned really well on the pro tour,” he added, referring to the American NextGen stars. “I think there’s a really long way to go for all of us, but all of us know that, we’re ready put in the work, and we’re all going to push each other. I think soon we’ll all be in these big tournaments playing each other. I think it’ll be a pretty regular thing.”

Fritz next meets Spaniard Fernando Verdasco, the No. 15 seed.

Czech Jiri Vesely, the 2013 ATP Star Of Tomorrow presented by Emirates, will face defending champion and fifth seed Kevin Anderson in the second round. Vesely opened his campaign with a 3-6, 6-3, 6-3 win over lucky loser Tim Van Rijthoven.