PARIS (AP) — Top-seeded Novak Djokovic could meet his longtime rival Rafael Nadal in the second round of the Paris Olympic tennis tournament.
Djokovic was drawn Thursday against Australian Matthew Ebden and Nadal faces Hungaraian Marton Fucsovics, with the winners of those matches meeting in Round 2.
The 38-year-old Nadal won a record 14 of his 22 major trophies at the French Open. He won gold in singles at Beijing in 2008, and in doubles with Marc López at Rio de Janeiro in 2016.
“Roland Garros as everybody knows is the most special place in tennis for me. I am enjoying the fact I am back for the Olympics," Nadal said on stage after the draw. "I am just trying to enjoy every single moment.”
French Open champion Carlos Alcaraz takes on Lebanese player Hady Habib.
Top-ranked Iga Swiatek of Poland faces Irina-Camelia Begu of Romania in the first round of the women’s draw with second-seeded American Coco Gauff taking on Australian Ajla Tomljanović.
Gauff is the reigning U.S. Open champion and is making her Olympic debut. She is a flag bearer for the U.S. team at Friday’s opening ceremony along with basketball star LeBron James. She will be the first tennis athlete to carry the U.S. flag.
Djokovic and Swiatek have not won Olympic gold.
Djokovic owns 24 Grand Slam trophies, more than anyone else in tennis apart from Margaret Court, but his only Olympic medal was bronze at Beijing in 2008.
Swiatek has won the French Open four of the past five years on the same clay courts at Roland Garros.
Four-time major winner Naomi Osaka of Japan takes on three-time major champion Angelique Kerber of Germany.
Wimbledon runner-up Jasmine Paolini of Italy, who is seeded fourth, returns to the courts where she lost the French Open final to Swiatek and takes on Romanian Ana Bogdan. No. 5-seeded American Jessica Pegula plays Viktorija Golubic of Switzerland.
Wimbledon champion Barbora Krejcikova of the Czech Republic — seeded ninth — is drawn against Spaniard Sara Sorribes Tormo. The 2022 Wimbledon champ Elena Rybakina — seeded third — plays Romanian Jaqueline Cristian. No. 10 Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia, who won the French Open here in 2017 for her only major, faces Colombian Camila Osorio.
Men’s and women’s first-round play begins Saturday, and the top-ranked man won’t be playing. Jannik Sinner pulled out on Wednesday because of tonsillitis. The 22-year-old from Italy posted on X that he took medical advice to sit out the Summer Games.
Eighth-seeded Stefanos Tsitsipas, the 2021 French Open runner-up to Djokovic, takes on Belgian Zizou Bergs and three-time major winner Stan Wawrinka of Switzerland is up against Pavel Kotov.
Wimbledon semifinalist Lorenzo Musetti of Italy, seeded 11th, plays French veteran Gael Monfils. Two-time French Open runner-up Casper Ruud of Norway, the No. 6 seed, takes on Japan's Taro Daniel.
Also, it's No. 4 Daniil Medvedev vs. Rinky Hijikata of Australia and No. 7-seeded American Taylor Fritz vs. big-serving Kazakh Alexander Bublik.
Tokyo Games champion Alexander Zverev of Germany plays Jaume Munar of Spain.
Two-time Olympic champion Andy Murray has withdrawn from singles but will play in men’s doubles alongside Dan Evans in his adieu from tennis. They face Japanese pair Japan’s Daniel and Kei Nishikori.
The 37-year-old Murray, a three-time Slam champion, won gold in singles at London in 2012 and Rio four years later. Since having hip replacement surgery in 2019, he has struggled with various injuries and withdrew from singles at Wimbledon because he needed a procedure to remove a cyst from his spine.
“The Olympics has been incredibly special to me. I’m really happy I get to do this one more time,” Murray said on stage. “I just ran out of time really (to play singles), but happy to be in the doubles with Dan and we play well together.”
In women’s doubles, top-seeded American pair Gauff and Pegula drew Australian pair Daria Saville and Ellen Perez.
Also in men's doubles, Nadal teams up with Alcaraz against sixth-seeded Argentines Maximo Gonzalez and Andres Molteni.
Tsitsipas teams up with younger brother Petros to face Portuguese pair Nuno Borges and Francisco Cabral.
AP Summer Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/2024-paris-olympic-games
Spain's Rafael Nadal returns the ball to Portugal's Nuno Borges during the singles final of the Nordea Open tennis tournament in Bastad, Sweden, Sunday, July 21, 2024. (Bjoern Larsson Rosvall/TT News Agency via AP)
FILE - Serbia's Novak Djokovic plays a shot against Argentina's Francisco Cerundolo during their fourth-round match of the French Open tennis tournament at the Roland Garros stadium in Paris, June 3, 2024. For the first time in more than 30 years, the tennis competition at an Olympics will be held on red clay, which means players who just made the adjustment from that surface at the French Open in early June to grass at Wimbledon in early July now will need to reverse course again in short order. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus, File)
