{"id":146608,"date":"2025-09-19T03:08:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-19T03:08:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/146608\/"},"modified":"2025-09-19T03:08:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-19T03:08:07","slug":"andre-agassi-patrick-rafter-lead-team-worlds-new-era-atp-tour","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/146608\/","title":{"rendered":"Andre Agassi, Patrick Rafter lead Team World’s new era | ATP Tour"},"content":{"rendered":"

Laver Cup
\n No. 1 Club icons unite: Agassi, Rafter lead Team World’s new era<\/p>\n

Former World No. 1s take reins<\/p>\n

September 18, 2025<\/p>\n

\"Team<\/p>\n

Ezra Shaw\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Team World captain Andre Agassi (middle) and vice captain Patrick Rafter (left) greet Jakub Mensik.
\n By ATP Staff<\/p>\n

Andre Agassi<\/a> and Patrick Rafter<\/a> often battled at some of the sport\u2019s biggest tournaments in their day. Now, they will stand side by side as they guide Team World at the Laver Cup<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\nTeam World captain Agassi and vice captain Rafter, two of the 29 members in the ATP No. 1 Club<\/a>, are taking over in a new era of Laver Cup<\/a> leadership. Agassi is replacing John McEnroe<\/a> as Team World\u2019s captain while Yannick Noah<\/a> spearheads Team Europe, formerly led by Bjorn Borg<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cTruth be told, I don\u2019t think I would\u2019ve done it if Pat didn\u2019t say he would join me,\u201d Agassi told ATPTour.com. \u201cI literally said, \u2018You\u2019re the guy I want\u2019. He was one of the great players, one of the great athletes, one of the great competitors.\u201d<\/p>\n

You May Also Like: Laver Cup: Teams, Dates, History & All You Need To Know<\/a><\/p>\n

\nAgassi and Rafter met 15 times, spanning 1993-2001, in their Lexus ATP Head2Head rivalry, with the American winning 10 of those matches. Now, more than two decades after their final meeting, Agassi and Rafter’s mutual respect and friendship will be on display in San Francisco. <\/p>\n

\n\u201cHe was one of those guys who when I lost to him, I could actually take a little solace in the fact that, \u2018Well, at least Pat won and I\u2019m happy for him\u2019,\u201d reflected Agassi. \u201cHe just always earned players’ respect on and off the court and now to share the same side of the net with him is a win for me.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nRafter echoed that same sentiment to the assembled media: \u201cAndre asked me, \u201cDo you want to be involved?\u201d Being with Andre is awesome. I did keep in contact with him once a year. You don’t often keep in contact with a lot of the ex-players. Just so much respect for him\u2026 This is so beautiful, so amazing. [I’m] spoiled rotten, I’m loving it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nAfter a narrow 13-11 defeat last year, Team World will aim for its third Laver Cup<\/a> triumph (2022, 2023) with new voices on the sideline.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Laver Cup No. 1 Club icons unite: Agassi, Rafter lead Team World’s new era Former World No. 1s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":146609,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[101,118,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-146608","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-sports","9":"tag-tennis","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146608","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=146608"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146608\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/146609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=146608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=146608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=146608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}