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Category: Tennis
The First of Grand Slam Clashes
The first Grand Slam tournament on the sporting calendar is just about to begin. This is the first stop along the route of major Grand Slam events followed by the French Open, Wimbledon and the US Open.
A Flash of History
Australian Open tournament, previously known as the Australasian Championships, was first played in November 1905 in Melbourne. It was later renamed to the Australian Championships in 1927 to finally emerge as the Australian Open back in 1969. Five Australian cities (Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide, Brisbane, and Perth) hosted the first tournament matches and two New Zealand cities (Christchurch and Hastings). Due to a generally remote location of the tournament, it was decided in 1972 that the tournament should be moved to a place that would guarantee attracting the biggest number of players and viewers. Melbourne was selected and the decision brought about a 90 percent increase in attendance after the Australian Open started to be played in the Melbourne Park complex in 1988.
Off the Charts
The early stages of the event were quite humble. No wonder - in the 1920s, the boat trip from Europe to Australia took approximately 45 days! The tournament needed names and such names started to appear at the beginning of the 1980s. Ivan Lendl, John McEnroe, and Mats Wilander were among those who decided to participate in the Australian Open giving it a wider audience and certain prominence. Also, fluctuating and inconvenient dates that the championships were held made it quite unpopular initially. Only a few players were ready to travel thousands of miles around the Christmas and New Year time. In 1987, the Australian Open date was fixed and is now played in mid-January.
The Prize
Currently, pretty much like most of the Grand Slam tournaments, the Australian Open obviously features men's and women's singles; men's, women's and mixed doubles and junior championships; as well as wheelchair, legends and exhibition events. The total prize money for the tournament amounts to 40 million Australian dollars with approximately $3,000,000 awarded to the winner in singles.
The Top Players
For many years now, the Australian Open Championships have been drawing the top tennis players in the world. This year is no different – all prominent names will find their ways to the courts. If you are interested in exact draws for this year's competitions, they can be found right here. The alphabetical list of all participating players with their short bio notes is here. If you are interested in the names of the players who won all Australian Open titles since its very beginning, all of them are listed here.
Novak Djokovic
World no. 2 Novak Djokovic won’t just be the defending champion when he returns to the Australian Open in 2020 – he will be the all-time title leader, having broken a three-way tie with Roger Federer and Roy Emerson when he delivered a dazzling performance against Rafael Nadal in the 2019 final. Now holding a total of 16 Grand Slams, Djokovic is closing the gap on rivals Federer and Nadal. We’re waiting for his magic at the 2020 Australian Open.
Naomi Osaka
After being outside the top 70 just a year before, Naomi Osaka climbed to the very top of the rankings when she won her second Grand Slam title at the Australian Open, defeating Petra Kvitova. The first player since Jennifer Capriati almost 20 years previously to win her first two major titles at back-to-back Grand Slams. Can she complete a successful title defense in 2020? We have to wait and see
Rafael Nadal
The 2009 champion Rafael Nadal once again fell short in his attempt to become the second man in the Open Era to win all Grand Slams at least twice when he was beaten by Djokovic in straight sets in the final – but his dominant run to the final without dropping a set shows there’s plenty of life in Nadal’s Australian Open career, especially after his devastating run of form to end 2019 as the World No. 1.
Petra Kvitova
Seven years after she reached her first Australian Open semi-final, a two-time Wimbledon winner Petra Kvitova reached her maiden Melbourne final without dropping a set in a series of stunning games. After losing the final to Osaka, she said that she wanted to win the title but had already won two years ago when she survived a knife attack in her home and managed to rebuild her career despite severe injuries to her playing hand. It will definitely be an interesting time for Petra this year.
Roger Federer
The 2017-18 champion found himself on the losing end of a generation clash with a new star Stefanos Tsitsipas and exited the Australian Open before the quarterfinals, then ignited speculation with his announcement that he would be playing the French Open in 2019 after skipping it in previous years. The 38-year-old is back for the 2020 Australian Open – and remains a legitimate threat to win a seventh title.
Coverage
The biggest Australian tennis event is broadcast worldwide by numerous networks. The official Australian Open site shows live scores and various additional attractions such as interviews, comments, news, reports, etc. Until last year, the Seven Network was an official Australian Open broadcaster. From 2019, the host broadcaster of the tournament is the Nine Network which will cover the matches for Australia and New Zealand after having signed a six-year-long deal till 2024.
In Europe, the exclusive rights are held by Eurosport. If you are in the UK and are looking to watch the live streaming of the Australian Open in your region, then you can look to subscribe to the free trial with Amazon Prime. Amazon Prime has live streaming rights to the Australian Open in the UK and if you are already their member, you can watch it for no extra cost. Daily highlights will also be available on the BBC.
The Middle East and Northern Africa are served by beIN Sports, and SuperSport will cover it for Sub-Sahara Africa.
The United States is served by ESPN (ESPN2, ESPN3, ESPN+) and the Tennis Channel. Canadian tennis fans can follow the tournament on TSN.
A lot of exciting videos can also be seen on the Australian Open TV YouTube channel.
Where to watch Australian Open 2020
The tournament can be followed live on a number of channels. Here are some of them:
How to watch
Most of the networks which offer coverage for specific areas of the world are usually restricted to those areas. If you happen to live in Australia or the US, you can simply watch it on your local channel. Living elsewhere, you are likely to encounter the message that the content from a given service is not available in your location. And this is when we step in.
All you need is your SDP account, Channel Group B set into Australia and that’s it.
You can also use our VPN technology by connecting to the VPN server which is situated in the area where you want to stream the matches from, sign in or sign up for the service that you plan to use (most of them have free trial periods that can take you practically through the entire tournament) and stream the matches.
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