For the first time in 15 years, the Billie Jean King Cup by Gainbridge will return to Melbourne this April, with Australia\u2019s No.1 woman Maya Joint set to lead the team.<\/p>\n
Headlining a blockbuster clash, the Culture Amp Australian Billie Jean King Cup team will take on Great Britain in the upcoming qualifying tie at John Cain Arena from Friday 10 to Saturday 11 April.<\/p>\n
The winner of the tie will advance to the eight-nation Finals, scheduled for September in China.<\/p>\n
Nineteen-year-old Joint said she is looking forward to leading the team at the home of the Australian Open.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s an amazing feeling to represent your country. To be able to do it again in Australia is just super special. It’s going to be such an amazing atmosphere and I can’t wait,\u201d Joint said.<\/p>\n
Eight-time Grand Slam champion and Australian team captain Sam Stosur today confirmed that BJK Cup stalwart Storm Hunter, former world No.1 in doubles, will line up alongside Joint in Melbourne.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor me, the best weeks of the year are wearing the green and gold,\u201d Hunter said. \u201cThey’re the best memories of my career and we want to make Australia proud. Super pumped to be able to come home and play on John Cain Arena. We’re going to give it everything.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re thrilled we have the opportunity to play at home against a tough team like Great Brittain,\u201d Stosur said. \u201cStorm brings a wealth of experience to the team and always represents herself and country with pride. Maya is currently our No.1 player and has had such a fast rise up the rankings. It\u2019s fantastic to have her back representing Australia once again.\u201d<\/p>\n
With no AFL matches in Melbourne at this time, the BJK Cup brings families an affordable and exciting weekend of world-class tennis at Melbourne Park.<\/p>\n
The two nations will compete in a best-of-five-rubber format, consisting of four singles matches and one doubles match. Each match is played as best of three sets.<\/p>\n
The remaining members of the Australian team will be confirmed mid-March.<\/p>\n
Tickets on sale TOMORROW – Tuesday 24 February<\/p>\n
Presale at 11am AEDT. General public on-sale at 5pm AEDT via Ticketek.\u00a0Kids 12&U go free across both days.Adult tickets from $23. Two-day adult ticket packages from $34.70<\/p>\n
About the Billie Jean King Cup<\/p>\n
The Billie Jean King Cup was first was founded in 1963 and is the world\u2019s premier women\u2019s team tennis competition. It is also the world\u2019s largest annual international team competition in all women’s sport, with a record 148 nations participating this year.<\/p>\n
Formerly known as the Federation Cup (1963-1995) and Fed Cup (1995-2020), the tournament was officially renamed in 2020 after Billie Jean King \u2013 one of the most influential figures in sport history.<\/p>\n
Fast facts<\/p>\n
Australia is one of four nations to have competed in the BJK Cup competition every year since it began.\u00a0Australia sits third on the all-time champions list with 7 wins, only behind Czechia (11) and United States (18).Evonne Goolagong, Dianne Fromholtz and Janet Young last led Australia to Fed Cup victory in 1974.In 2025, Australia lost their Qualifiers tie 2\u20131 to Kazakhstan. However, they rebounded with a 2\u20130 Play-off win over Brazil to secure a place back in the 2026 Qualifiers against Great Britain.Melbourne last hosted a BJK Cup tie in April 2011, with Ukraine defeating Australia 3-2.\u00a0Australia last played Great Brittain in a BJK Cup tie in the 2022 Qualifiers, winning 2-1 after a nail-biting tie-deciding doubles super tie-break.Australia is currently ranked the No.12 nation in Billie Jean King Cup rankings.Australia has finished runners-up twice in recent years, in 2019 and 2022.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For the first time in 15 years, the Billie Jean King Cup by Gainbridge will return to Melbourne…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":498217,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[565],"tags":[64,63,38306,31229,72820,85,747],"class_list":["post-498216","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-billie-jean-king-cup","tag-maya-joint","tag-news-article","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/498216","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=498216"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/498216\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/498217"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=498216"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=498216"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=498216"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}