Three official matches labelled as the ‘Battle of the Sexes’ have taken place – most famously between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs in 1973.<\/p>\n
American veteran Riggs had beaten Australia’s Margaret Court before King exacted revenge four months later.<\/p>\n
In 1992, a 40-year-old Jimmy Connors beat fellow multiple Grand Slam champion Martina Navratilova, then 35, under hybrid rules.<\/p>\n
“I have so much respect for Billie Jean King and what she has done for the women’s game,” Sabalenka added.<\/p>\n
“I’m proud to represent women’s tennis and to be part of this modern take of the iconic ‘Battle of the Sexes’ match.” <\/p>\n
Kyrgios, who reached the 2022 Wimbledon final, said he will relish the chance to play against Sabalenka, with whom he shares the same agent.<\/p>\n
“When the world number one challenges you, you answer the call. I’ve got massive respect for Aryna; she’s a powerhouse and a true champion,” he said.<\/p>\n
“But I’ve never backed down from a challenge, and I’m not just here to play, I’m here to entertain. This is what I live for.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Three official matches labelled as the ‘Battle of the Sexes’ have taken place – most famously between Billie…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":261774,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[565],"tags":[64,63,85,747],"class_list":["post-261773","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/261773","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=261773"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/261773\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/261774"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=261773"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=261773"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=261773"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}