Queen’s to become British stronghold once again
This summer between 17th to 23rd June the green grass of the Queen’s Club in West London will once again be packed with British tennis talent as three British players secure a main draw entry for the first time since 2006
Back then it was Andy Murray, at the time a mere 19 years old, Tim Henman and Greg Rusedski who secured direct entry into the tournament then known as the Stella Artois Championships. A lot has changed in the following 13 years but Queen’s is still the host to one of the biggest grass court tournaments of the year outside of Wimbledon
This year the three British main draw entries will be Kyle Edmund (World No. 22) and Cameron Norrie (World No.45) who will hopefully be joined by Sir Andy Murray who has been promised a Wild Card by the organisers. The number of British players may well increase as no doubt the qualifying event will feature a few of the other professional British players on the tour such as World No.81 Dan Evans
The Lawn Tennis Association, Britain’s governing body of tennis and the ultimate owner of the Queen’s Cub Championships, will be delighted to have three players in the draw especially as they’ve received plenty of bad press in recent times over their perceived lack of success in producing top quality tennis players despite their huge annual budget.
The tournament is now known as the Fever Tree Championships thanks to a sponsorship deal with the tonic water brand. Maybe a sign of the times that the title sponsor was once an alcohol brand and is now a soft drink that you add to alcohol!
The rest of the 32 man filed that have confirmed their attendance at Queens this year looks fantastically strong with Juan Martin del Potro (World No.8), Kevin Anderson (World No.6) and Marin Cilic (World No.11) joining the British contingent.
A long list of exciting youngsters will be trying their luck on the grass including high flyers such as Stefano Tsitsipas (World No.9), Nick Kyrgios (World No.35), Alex de Minaur (World no.27) and Felix Auger Aliassime (World no.30)
The current full list of main draw entries is as follows:
1 Kevin Anderson
2 Juan Martin Del Potro
3 Stefanos Tsitsipas
4 Marin Cilic
5 Daniil Medvedev
6 Milos Raonic
7 Marco Cecchinato
8 Denis Shapovalov
9 Kyle Edmund
10 Diego Schwartzman
11 Alex de Minaur
12 Lucas Pouille
13 Gilles Simon
14 Felix Auger-Aliassime
15 Cristian Garin
16 Stan Wawrinka
17 Nick Kyrgios
18 Martin Fucsovics
19 Frances Tiafoe
20 Fernando Verdasco
21 Mikhail Kukushkin
22 Cameron Norrie
23 Grigor Dimitrov
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