Most tennis players would imaginably be feeling quite excited on the eve of the second Grand Slam tournament in the calendar.
But Nick Kyrgios isn’t most tennis players. The Australian has been preparing for the French Open, the showpiece event of the clay season, by heading to the grass courts of Wimbledon to hit with Andy Murray and went live on Instagram beforehand to give an update on his schedule.
And the 24-year-old made no efforts to hide his disdain at the prospect of swapping SW19 for Paris ahead of the start of the tournament on May 26.
“The fact I am here now and then have to go to Paris in a couple of days... French Open sucks compared to this place. Sucks,” Kyrgios, who repeatedly marvelled at the prospect of playing on grass during his broadcast, said.
“Get rid of the clay man, who likes the clay? It is so, so bad.”
The world No 36 has recently found himself attracting attention for his critical comments of opponents such as Novak Djokovic and his meltdown at the Italian Open last week. Playing on a noisy outside court where the crowds can wander in and out, he became riled by spectators before engaging in an exchange with officials after being made to forfeit a game to go 2-1 down in the deciding set.
Having angrily hurled his racket to the floor he threw the fold-up chair onto the playing surface and then went into an expletive-filled rant, shouting at the chair: “I am giving 100 per cent to deal with f****** idiots like him, I’m done. I’m f****** done. I’m f****** done with it. I don’t give a f***.”
He then put his bag over his shoulder and walked off court, but was officially defaulted from the match. He was fined £17,000. The incident came the day after Kyrgios hit out at Djokovic on the No Challenges Remaining podcast.
“I just feel like he’s got a sick obsession with wanting to be liked,” Kyrgios said. “He just wants to be Federer. I feel he wants to be liked so much that I just can’t stand him. This whole celebration thing is so cringeworthy, it’s very cringeworthy.”
