The first round at the Aegon International promises thrills and spills with some nail-biting clashes revealed at Saturday's official draw.
In the women's draw local hope Johanna Konta will face world No.44 Su-Wei Hsieh in the first round. A wild card into the main draw of the WTA Premier event for the first time, Konta reached the second round of qualifying at Devonshire Park in 2012 and said she's excited to be playing in front of a home crowd again.
“As tennis players, the number of weeks we spend at home is very limited so to play a tournament in my home town is a great feeling, it's very special,” said Konta. “When there is a good crowd out there you can feed off their energy, so it's a really good feeling to play in front of people from my home town.”
Tournament top seed Agnieszka Radwanska and wild cards British No.1 Laura Robson and No.6 Elena Baltacha all drew qualifiers.
Defending champion Tamira Paszek faces a tough assignment against former world No.1 Caroline Wozniacki. “It's such an amazing draw again this year, so I'm going to give it my all and do my best to win twin back-to-back titles,” said the 22-year-old Austrian.
The 2013 Aegon International will see Sam Stosur and Nadia Petrova clash for the third time at Eastbourne, the Russian winning their 2008 semifinal clash 6-3 6-3, the Australian levelling the ledger in 2011 with a straight sets first round win.
In the men's draw British wild card James Ward will take on world No.63 Bernard Tomic while fellow wild card Kyle Edmund faces a qualifier.
In other main draw first round matches, No.6 seed Alexandr Dolgopolov faces Fernando Verdasco for the second time in their careers, the Spaniard winning their first clash at Rome in 2012, and No.5 seed Kevin Anderson takes on Julien Benneteau.
Qualifying action kicked off at the Aegon International on Saturday, British No.5 Tara Moore defeating No.4 Anne Keothavong 6-4 6-3 to advance to the second round where she will face Karolina Pliskova in the opening match on Centre Court on Sunday.
Meanwhile, former world No.4 James Blake defeated Great Britain's Joshua Milton in the first round of qualifying and wild card Evan Hoyt in the second round to advance to a third round qualifying match against Sergiy Stakhovsky, which will take place third match on Centre Court.
Sunday June 16 is Legends Day at the Aegon International with Centre Court action feature a quartet of tennis greats competing in a Father’s Day tussle. Former British No.1 Greg Rusedski will face off against Mark Philippoussis in the second match on Centre Court before the men team up with former world No.1 Lindsay Davenport and two-time Wimbledon doubles champion Rennae Stubbs in a mixed doubles match to round off the Centre Court action on day two.
A bumper crowd is expected at Devonshire Park this year with the tournament kicking off the action on Saturday with a Family Day that saw free entry to the grounds and unreserved seating on Centre Court and Court One.