Novak Djokovic & Jannik Sinner set to headline pickleball event ahead of US Open, just days after Serb's comment about it 'endangering' tennis

Novak Djokovic, Jannik Sinner, and Barbora Krejcikova will join pro-pickleball Callie Jo Smith for a pickleball event in New York ahead of the 2024 US Open. The event, called The HEAD NYC Mash Up, is sponsored by racquet company Head and is scheduled for August 22.

Head's tennis racquets are used by some of the biggest tennis players, such as Coco Gauff, Alexander Zverev, Taylor Fritz, Andrey Rublev, and Karolina Muchova apart from Sinner, Djokovic, and Krejcikova.

Ahead of the final Grand Slam of the season, Head had lined up some of their biggest stars to try their hand at pickleball. The tennis trio of Sinner, Djokovic, and Krejcikova will be joined by Callie Jo Smith, a pickleball player, for the event.

This comes just days after the 24-time Grand Slam said that pickleball was a threat to tennis' future. He said during a media interaction at Wimbledon 2024 that the future of tennis was endangered due to pickleball's rise in popularity. He said that this was due to pickleball being more economical than tennis.

"Now we have the padel or pickleball, as you call it in the States, that is growing and emerging. People kind of have fun with it and say, Yeah, but tennis is tennis. Tennis is the king or queen of all the racquet sports, that's true. But on a club level, tennis is endangered. If we don't do something about it, as I said, globally or collectively, padel, pickleball in States, they're going to convert all the tennis clubs into padel and pickleball because it's just more economical," he said at a press conference.

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Novak Djokovic enters US Open 2024 as defending champion, Jannik Sinner favorite to lift the title

Novak Djokovic and Jannik Sinner set to play at the 2024 US Open (Image: Getty)

Novak Djokovic will return to Flushing Meadows as a defending champion, having won the title by defeating Daniil Medvedev in the final in 2023. He defeated Alexandre Müller, Bernabé Zapata Miralles, Laslo Djere, Borna Gojo, Taylor Fritz, and Ben Shelton en route to the summit clash.

The Serb would look to defend his title, which would be his first ATP-level title this year. However, he won the gold medal at the Paris Olympics 2024. He would want to add a fifth US Open title, after winning it in 2011, 2015, 2018, and 2023.

Jannik Sinner, on the other hand, has been having a stellar season, having won four titles this year. He would head into the final Grand Slam of the year as the heavy favorite to win the title. The Italian's best result at the US Open came in 2022 when he reached the quarterfinals, losing to arch-rival Carlos Alcaraz in a five-set thriller.