Former Wimbledon finalist Nick Kyrgios and Tokyo Olympics gold medalist Belinda Bencic will play their first Grand Slam after lengthy absences at subsequent month’s Australian Open with protected rankings, match organizers stated Friday.
Kyrgios, who will play with a protected rating of twenty first, has not performed in a Grand Slam since 2022 due to knee, foot and wrist accidents. Bencic, who gave delivery to a daughter in April, will return with a particular rating of fifteenth.
“Kyrgios and Bencic are amongst six males and 6 ladies competing … utilizing protected rankings, setting the main-draw entry rating cut-off for each fields at world No. 98,” the organizers stated in an announcement.
Former world No. 4 Kei Nishikori may even play with a protected rating, making his first look within the Australian Open males’s singles since 2021, the assertion added.
Defending champions Jannik Sinner and Aryna Sabalenka, who’re on the prime of the boys’s and girls’s rankings, would be the prime seeds at Melbourne Park, with 24-time Grand Slam champion Novak Djokovic eyeing a document eleventh Australian Open title.
