Hewitt: 'De Minaur set his mind on AO, he would love to face a top rival'
Alex de Minaur was one of the young guns to watch in 2018, making quite a journey from outside the top-200 towards the top-30 following his great runs in Sydney, Washington and the NextGen Finals. Recognized as one of the fastest and most determined players on the Tour, Alex earned the 2018 ATP Newcomer of the Year award and it didn't take him long to top the headlines at the beginning of 2019 after winning the first ATP title in Sydney. Alongside the coach Alfonso Gutierrez (Alex lives and works in Alicante, Spain), there has been a notable figure in his box to guide him towards the maiden ATP crown, a former world no. 1 and a two-time Grand Slam champion Lleyton Hewitt.
The youngster had a chance to learn a lot from the player who knows everything about achieving tennis glory at such a young age and one could draw a lot of similarities between the two, especially their quickness and the determination to never give up the point and do everything to extend the rally. Alex and Lleyton had to leave Sydney without a proper celebration, heading to Melbourne where they had a practice run on Sunday, feeling the court before de Minaur's first match against Pedro Sousa on Monday.
Hewitt is confident that Alex could do damage in the draw, targeting the world no. 2 Rafael Nadal as the main rival in the first week, in what could be a blockbuster third round encounter. The youngster has already shown he fears no one and he will now try to shift the momentum from Sydney to Melbourne and continue the winning streak.
"He handles the limelight pretty well," said Hewitt. "I guess in some ways people still haven’t seen a lot of him because he hasn’t made the headlines as much as Nick Kyrgios and Bernard Tomic and these kind of guys, even though he has been our No. 1. But he loves playing in front of a crowd. I think he’s the kind of kid who likes playing on the big stage. He won’t be daunted. I think he looks forward to being the center of attention. I saw that in Davis Cup.. he wanted to be put out there against the big names, he doesn’t shy away from it. He would deep down love the opportunity to come up against one of the big guys here.
We don’t mind the heat. He’s playing in the middle of the heat on Monday.. and his body can bounce back because of the hard work he’s put in. The balls get pretty lively in the heat too and sometimes you can get a little bit more on your shots as well. One thing for sure is he’s had his mind set on the Australian Open and preparing as well as possible for this tournament so he’s going to go out there and give it everything."
from Tennis World USA http://bit.ly/2M6FPOH
No comments