Davis Cup culture to drive success: Hewitt

Wednesday, 30 January 2019:

LLEYTON HEWITT of The World team serves against Andy Roddick of The Americas team during their Men's Singles match during the BNP Paribas Showdown at Madison Square Garden in New York City.
LLEYTON HEWITT of The World team serves against Andy Roddick of The Americas team during their Men's Singles match during the BNP Paribas Showdown at Madison Square Garden in New York City.


The Davis Cup is the vehicle to drive Australia's tennis culture on a road to success, Lleyton Hewitt says.

Hewitt will be a non-playing captain when Australia host Bosnia and Herzegovina in a cup tie in Adelaide from Friday.

And he believes the tie gives Australia a chance to lay down a cultural blueprint.

"The Davis Cup is a vehicle to be able to really push the culture that we want moving forward and set the standards not just for myself but what our team expects" Hewitt said.

"And that's not just Davis Cup weeks. We expect these guys to go out and represent Australia every single week of the year exceptionally well and push each other to get better.

"To go out there and want to compete and want to lay it on the line week after week, it's not an easy thing to do."

Hewitt will captain an Australian team minus controversial duo Nick Kyrgios and Bernard Tomic.

And he said the team of Alex de Minaur, John Millman, Jordan Thompson, John Peers and Alexei Popyrin had a chance to push each other to greater heights not just in Davis Cup but also the individual tour.

"Tennis is a very individual sport and Australia is one of the toughest countries to come from to be a tennis professional because you're not fortunate to come back home (during the season), you're out on the road for a lot of the weeks," Hewitt said.

"So for these guys to gel together and help each other get better, I think that's something that (Tony Roche) Rochey and I really want to see moving forward.

"It was a breakthrough summer for a log of these guys and it's because they're pushing each other, they're wanting each other to get better day-in, day out."






AAP






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