Team England’s Dan Evans upped the ante ahead of Schroders Battle of the Brits – Scotland v England getting underway at the P&J Live on Wednesday.
The former British number one is part of Team England alongside Jack Draper, Paul Jubb and doubles stars Neal Skupski and Joe Salisbury, with the side captained by football manager Ian Holloway.
Team Scotland will be skippered by Scotland legend Ally McCoist and Aberdeen’s 1999 Open champion Paul Lawrie, and includes Sir Andy Murray, tournament director Jamie Murray, Aidan McHugh and Jonny O’Mara.
In the lead-up to the event, Evans has found himself at the centre of Davis Cup controversy after making comments about the player selection for a Team GB doubles match back in September.
Evans opens the Aberdeen tournament alongside Scottish youngster McHugh, when they meet on Wednesday night for the first professional tennis match to be played in the Granite City since 2006.
He returns to the court on Thursday afternoon to play Murray, and Evans believes the non-competitive status of the tournament actually makes things more competitive, and wants to take advantage of that.
“It makes it even more competitive,” Evans explained. “Sometimes you play each other on the tour and it’s a bit awkward – I find it pretty awkward to play Andy on the tour, to sort of get in his face a bit.
“There’s no points or anything playing here (in Aberdeen) and there’s a crowd.
“It would be quite good fun to beat him here – and, obviously, with Aidan (McHugh) it would be nice to give him a bit of a hiding.
“I don’t know if the bookies do a book on this, but I don’t know who would be favourites if they did – it’d be pretty tight, I think.”
But when asked if he will be the pantomime villain at the P&J Live, Evans played down the role and joked he would be conserving his energy for the fight on the tennis court.
“Nah, I’ve got to save my energies,” the current world number 27 added.
“I might have to play two or three matches. I might even get a game of doubles, you never know – the irony.”
Playing in Scotland can be good preparation for Australia
Despite the fighting talk, Evans, who reached a career-high ranking of 22 in the world in 2021, is looking forward to playing Sir Andy on his home soil and is grateful for the chance to play in front of a big crowd in the north-east of Scotland.
“I’m really lucky I’m going to get to play Andy in Scotland, that’s an amazing thing to be part of,” Evans said.
“I’ve heard the tickets have basically sold out, and that’s amazing for the event and it will be an amazing atmosphere.
“It always is up in Scotland and it’ll be quite interesting to be on the other side of it.”
Following Christmas, Evans will head down under for an ATP event in Adelaide, which begins on January 9, before the first grand slam of year in Melbourne: the Australian Open.
Ahead of those matches in 2023, Evans reckons the combination of the high quality of competitive tennis and the big crowd in Aberdeen will act as good preparation.
“It’s a great chance to play some tennis in a competitive environment just before I leave for Australia,” Evans said. “It’s not often you play in front of 6,000 people.
“It’s not like you’re playing every day in front of that many people. It’s a big crowd – it’ll be good matches, a great atmosphere and it’ll be really interesting to see who wins, (and) how everybody is playing.”
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