Rafael Nadal set to participate in Fast4 tennis in Sydney in January

Rafael Nadal of Spain has committed to play in the Fast4 exhibition tennis event in Sydney, Australia in January 2016.

The 14-time Grand Slam champion Nadal will be joining Gael Monfils of France, former player John McEnroe of the United States to form the World Team, which will go up against the Australian Team composed of Nick Kyrgios, veteran Lleyton Hewitt and former player Pat Cash.

The Fast4 event was launched last year with Roger Federer of Switzerland and Hewitt going up against each other in the match that had a different format from the usual format in the ATP tour. Among the changes are, the no-deuces rule, first to four games wins a set and play continues after lets on serves. Federer won against Hewitt, 4-3 (5-3) 2-4 3-4 (3-5) 4-0 4-2 in the match that was broadcasted live in Australia.

“It’s easy for the crowd to get involved in every point which makes for a great atmosphere,” Nadal, who also played in a Fast4 exhibition match last year, said via an afp.com article.

The event will serve as some sort of warm-up tournament for the 2016 Australian Open, which opens Jan. 18.

While the Australian exhibition is still about two months away, Nadal is preparing for the ATP World Tour Final 2015 in London in the season-ending tournament held at The O2 in London, United Kingdom.

The top eight players in the ATP rankings qualified with Nadal scheduled to have three matches, against Andy Murray of Scotland, Stan Wawrinka of Switzerland and David Ferrer of Spain. Novak Djokovic of Serbia, Federer, Tomas Berdych of Czech Republic and Kei Nishikori of Japan will play in the other group.

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