From The Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm christinamiot. It's Monday, January thirteenth. Peter Dutton launched the coalition's election campaign at a rally in Melbourne on Sunday, where he pledged to get Australia back on track.
Week Leaders create hard times, but strong leaders create better times. And the next federal election is a sliding to a moment foundation a return Labor government in majority or minority, we'll see setbacks set in.
Stone, the opposition leader said. The party's policies will come into focus in the run up to the federal election. Hospitals and schools in Queensland could be hit by massive strikes this year if the newly elected state government doesn't come to the party on pay rises. That exclusive story is live right now at the Australian dot com dot au. The Australian Open gets underway in Earnest today after Day one. Play was suspended early in the piece due to rain
or was in. Nick Kurrios will make a long awaited return to Grand Slam tennis tonight and he reckons an elusive win will silence his critics for good. That's today's story no one ever died wondering what Nick Kurios thought if.
I played ninety five percent of people to night on that court, I think I win. To be honest with you, Ah well, no, no man, Daniel serves straight down the throat. I mean, I've been pretty much every player that's picked up a racket. It's like I'm going out there putting on like a clown suit or something. Don't tell me how to play, Like, just sit on your seat and watch me play tennis. And anyone that thinks that I'm bad as for is just an idiot, like they've got obviously no idea.
No idea.
Curios has been especially vocal in his criticism of world number one Yannick Sinner in recent months.
I mean, I have to be spoken about it because I don't think there's enough people that are speaking about it. People are trying to sweep under the rug, and there's not fair treatment for every single player.
And I just think that Sinner will face court in Switzerland in April after he twice tested positive for a banned substance in early twenty twenty four, within weeks of a thrilling Australian Open win. The two time brand Slam winner claimed a band anabolic steroid entered his system after
his messeuse used it to treat a cut finger. The International Tennis Integrity Agency, which is the sport's highest tribunal, accepted that explanation and ultimately decided not to ban Yannick Sinner, but the World Antidoping Agency or WADA, will challenge the decision in an appeal said to be heard behind closed doors, and Nick Kurios reckons it's all pretty shady. In a post on x formerly known as Twitter, he said the appeal should be heard in public if Sinner truly has
nothing to hide. Now, the controversy is center court at the Australian Open, when Nick Kurios and Janick Sinner will play first round matches on Monday. Sinna is taking it in his stride.
I haven't done anything wrong. That's why I'm still here. That's why I'm supplaying. I don't want to respond on what Nick said or what other player says. I think the most important part is to have my people around me who I can't trust people They exactly know what happened and that's it.
And Curios, well, he couldn't be more confident.
I'm very confident in myself that I'm not going to be accidentally putting something in my system.
It's been three years since Nick Kurios last played in a Grand Slam.
He was bundled out in an upset today in an epic five set match, he lost to the twenty seventh seed Russian Karen Katchanov.
He's currently unranked after battling a string of injuries, but he said this week he's feeling good.
This morning was out there feeling pretty good when I'm just taking a day by day and just enjoying all the moments again to being part of the tournament.
And what Nick Curios wants more than anything is that elusive Grand Slam Singles title.
The one place is always underperformed at is the Grand slams.
Will Swanton is a senior sports writer with The Australian. He's in Melbourne for the Open.
The way he says it is that the only way to shut everyone up, as in his critics, is to go well at the majors. The driving force for this comeback, which might only be a year, as he says, is to push to win majors. He's reached the Wimbledon final, which is terrific. So a Wimbledon final is a Wimbledon final. But really apart from that, three quarter finals in twelve or thirteen years. But the great proving ground in tennis is the majors and his record is really poor. So
that's the big challenge for him. He'll be fascinating to see if he can get down and dirty for the two weeks of a major, his big problem being he's injured at the moment.
Nick Kurios came up against tennis's big four Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer and Andy Murray. But after decades of incomparable domination, a changing of the guard is underway. Nadal, Federer, and Murray have all bowed out with dozens of Grand Slams between them.
They just dominated the majors for the last fifteen years. Nick said it felt like it was virtually impossible to win a major because coming from mix lower position in the draw, he would probably have to beat two, maybe three of those guys, and like Andy Murray, Andy Murray could not have tried harder and more to win majors, and he only won a small number compared to those guys.
So if it's hard for Andy Murray to win majors in that era, definitely hard for Nick And so you can see where he's coming from the other side of it is he definitely didn't always give himself the best chance. You know's very hot and cold with preparation. He used to have that great kind of love hate relationship with tennis, which I think now in the wise old years of being twenty nine, I think he's falling in love with tennis. But Nick at is best as a tennis player, was
as good as those guys. He's played some brilliant matches at the Australian Open. But the great challenge of a major, and the great beauty of it is you have to play a great match on one day to be a good player. Then you have to come back two days later and do it again. That cycle for two weeks, and it's so hard to do. When your body gets more tired, your mind gets more tired, the pressure grows as you go along. But now it was twenty nine,
you can still be peaking when you're thirty five. In tennis. You've got these two young guys in Sinner and Alcaaz who have taken over there. Now the guy is defeat, but it doesn't have that same unbeatable aura that the Big three plus Andy Murray had, so we've still got time. If he knuckled down and at a proper crack, he can one hundred percent play as well as Alcarez a sinner, but it's just a matter of how much he wants
it and how the body holds up. So my gut feeling is it will be a stretch for him to get through the Australian Open in one piece, let alone win it.
Nick Curios will take on twenty three year old Scott Jacob Burnley on Monday night in the first round of his home country's Grand Slam. But could a loss in those early rounds signal the end of his Grand Slam dreams.
It's impossible to know, and that's the whole beauty of it. The number one thing obviously that wipes out any athlete in any sport is the physical side of it, and the body packs it in. So if his wrist doesn't come basically one hundred percent good, there could be a short stay for him back on the tour. He will love being back on that kind of stage. He's conducting everyone like it's an orchestra, and that's the kind of
thing he wants again. But at the end of the day, a professional athlete, you're there to win, and in the tournaments that really matter, he's just fallen short time and again.
Coming up Novak Djokovic's curious return to the Australian Open. In a pandemic of strange moments, this one was up there.
Australia's Immigration minister has counseled Nevakdrokovic's visa for a second time, just three days before the world number one player is due to play in the Australian Open in or. The Australian government says it is on public health grounds, as the row over his right to remain in the country unvaccinated continues.
And now the current world number seven has claimed in an interview with GQ magazine that he was poisoned while he was being held in hoteled attention in twenty twenty two. He said he discovered high levels of lead and mercury in his blood upon returning to Serbia after eating the food provided to him in Melbourne. Naturally, people had questions, but on Friday, Djokovic refused to elaborate.
I've done that interview many months ago, so I would appreciate not talking more in detail about that, as I would like to focus on the tennis and why I'm here.
Novak Djokovic arrives in Australia, this time off the back of a Golden Slam. That's when an individual player wins all four Grand Slams plus an Olympic gold medal. It's a feat only achieved by a handful of other tennis greats, including Serena Williams and Andre Agacy. Now, the thirty seven year old Serb will attempt to secure a record eleventh Australian Open win. Here's will Swanton.
He is a marvel of unwavering and ongoing desire just to keep winning. And that's where it comes from. You watch Novak hit a tennis ball, and he doesn't necessarily hit the ball any better than one hundred guys out there on the practice courts. But you get him into a match, and that will to win, and that will to prove himself and the love of the battle and the mental side of it doesn't seem to be slowing
up at all. But what is happening is he's starting to lose to guys who he would never lose to, and that's the first sign that an aging tennis player is on the slide. There's not so much the fact that he loses to Alcoraz in a Wimbledon final. There's early round defeats that kind of popping up. That's a funny one. Who's look for the first time that I can think of, Novak's the underdog here, the kind of null, worldly vecern who's trying to hold off the young punks.
So I think there'll be a bit of sentimental favoritism because for all the pantomime villainy over the years and all that kind of thing, I think you have to admire someone like that for not resting on his laurels and not thinking he's done enough. So I think at times he's really tried to win us over. It hasn't quite happened, but I think this year, when perhaps he's past trying to win us over, I think you probably will.
Will Swanton is a senior reporter with The Australian and you can catch all the action from the Australian Open anytime at the Australian dot com dot au