Coufal, who attended Wimbledon to cheer on West Ham fan Andy Lapthorne and his compatriot and 2024 ladies’ singles champion Barbora Krejčíková, thoroughly enjoyed the challenge and experience.
He smiled: “We were much better when they played with guitar, for example! It was a great afternoon, and the opportunity and the idea to come here and play with them was great, and we are really happy that we got this opportunity. We will also watch them on the weekend, so it will be perfect for us because we love tennis. I always wanted to try to play with professional players because Tomáš and I are really passionate tennis and padel players.”
So, if the two Hammers met each other in the men’s Wimbledon final, who would win?
Coufal was magnanimous, admitting: “We play each other often, and Tomáš is better than me; I have to say he's better. I need to work on my game, but one day I will maybe beat him in the Wimbledon final!”
Souček was also typically modest, saying: “He [Coufal] is a good player. We don't have that much time to play, but we always try to play in the summer when we have time away from football, and sometimes we play here in London as well. It's a very close game when we play against each other. You could see even today, it was like, one point for me, one point for Vlad, but it's always a good, competitive game.”
Back to the professionals and competing alongside De Minaur and Rune at the Copper Box Arena will be Gaël Monfils, Andrey Rublev, Ugo Humbert, Alexander Bublik, Thanasi Kokkinakis and Jan-Lennard Struff.
After three round-robin ties on Friday and Saturday, the top two finishers in each of two groups will compete in the semi-finals and final on Sunday. Tickets for the UTS Grand Final are available HERE.