UNITED CUP

December 29, 2022

Lleyton Hewitt

Alex De Minaur

Team Australia

Press Conference

C. NORRIE/A. de Minaur

6-3, 6-3

Team Great Britain - 1

Team Australia - 0

THE MODERATOR: Tough luck, Alex and Lleyton. Lleyton, can you just sum up in a few words the match, how you saw it.

CAPTAIN HEWITT: It was always going to be a tough match against Norrie. He's very confident, had a great year the last year and a half, really.

Yeah, this surface, pretty cold conditions out there tonight, as well. Alex had that early chance to break. Wasn't able to take it. But then, yeah, Cam did very little wrong from start to finish. So, yeah, just wasn't our night tonight.

THE MODERATOR: Questions, please.

Q. Alex, just explain how that first outing was and what you thought you did well and didn't do so well.

ALEX de MINAUR: Well, look, it's first match of a new season. Either going to start well or not. It probably wasn't my best performance, but, you know, got lots to look forward to.

So I think I made a couple too many errors today in certain areas, and, yeah, just didn't play my overall best tennis. It's the way the cookie crumbles sometimes.

Q. Was there an element of trying new things today perhaps that are experimental or anything like that, or was it just a matter of being away for a while?

ALEX de MINAUR: Look, ultimately you want to start the season in the best way possible and really get in a groove early on. Sometimes it happens. First time you step out on court, it feels like everything has worked. Obviously this is my first match in a while, and it just didn't click today. I'd love to hopefully build on that and do my best to get that feeling back.

Q. Did that game where you had the breakpoints and weren't able to break play on your mind for a while, considering that he broke you the next game?

ALEX de MINAUR: Look, honestly when you look at how it all played out, I probably lost focus a little bit and ended up that next game playing, starting off pretty badly, and gave him three cheap errors to basically give him a Love-40 lead. Yeah, I probably can't do that. That's something just got to be better at and just kind of focus and just play it like another game.

Yeah, just didn't do a couple things well today.

Q. How much of the loss can you put down to only learning who you were playing yesterday?

ALEX de MINAUR: Look, ultimately I'm ready to play anyone. So, yeah, been hitting with righties all week, and now I'm playing two lefties. So a little bit different. Yeah, I don't think it factored too much into the level that I put out today.

I have got to be better, and that's the reality. You know, I will get back on the training court and make sure I'm better for my next match.

Q. Lleyton, is that the way you feel, as well, as the captain?

CAPTAIN HEWITT: Probably not. I think Alex is probably a bit hard on himself. I know how hard he's been training and working, and obviously his focus was always going to be playing tomorrow night against Dan Evans.

So to have that thrown on him yesterday wasn't easy, and also, just his training patterns and his workload, focused on what he was planning to do. Yeah, it's funny how it turns out. As he said, he's got to be play two lefties now, where he was planning on playing two righties. It is completely different. It's just not ideal, I'd say, for him. But, yeah, he's not going to make excuses, that's for sure.

Q. Lleyton, you weren't here yesterday when it went down and Nick was out. What did you make of it, and did you have a chance to speak to him today and how disappointed he was not to be part of United Cup?

CAPTAIN HEWITT: I was in the same boat as all the other players yesterday, so I didn't know any more. It was pretty tough for everyone.

It was more probably the lack of communication, I think, and for these guys not knowing. You know, I'm so proud of this bloke and the effort and how he makes playing for his country a priority, it's something I'm very proud of him. As I said, he's not going to make excuses for tonight's performance, but he will come out in three nights' time and I think be better for the run tonight against Rafa. I think for the whole team it was pretty tough not knowing what was going on the last 24 hours.

Q. You have got to deal with this a little bit now, the Davis Cup and here as well. Do you have any thoughts on why this situation is panning out?

CAPTAIN HEWITT: Not really. It's more just, yeah, the communication, and just, if it was just Nick, that's one thing, but when it revolves around the team and other people and I guess their preparation for, you know, they want to be playing as well as they possibly can, not just in this event but also leading into the Australian Open, so, yeah, that's probably the hardest thing.

Q. Is there a way that's obvious for communication to be improved, Lleyton?

CAPTAIN HEWITT: Probably just responding. That's the normal way of doing it.

Q. So you tried to contact him and got no response? Is that...

CAPTAIN HEWITT: There was a little while, yeah.

Q. Lleyton, you played Hopman Cup, so you have had some experience on the whole mixed team concept. How have you found this experience? Do you feel this is a bit different? I know you were a player there and you're a captain this time and there is that difference, but your overall thoughts.

CAPTAIN HEWITT: Yeah, it's too early to say, to be honest right now. It is a different feel purely because there is a lot of players on the team, as well, which is completely different, and trying to be across all those players as well and, you know, with the two captains it's completely different.

So I think we will just have to see how the week plans out and base it on that. Playing the Hopman Cup, for me, I knew that was an exhibition event as well. There weren't points involved. So for me it was all about representing your country, but it was slightly different to ever play in Davis Cup for me. It was about getting those matches though and having a good preparation going into the Australian Open.