Nick Kyrgios ruling himself out of the Rio Olympics is the result of a shameful bullying campaign
THE BULLYING campaign aimed at Nick Kyrgios was shameful and his surrender to an Olympic lynch mob must now expose certain other athletes to scrutiny, writes Leo Schlink.
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ANNA Flanagan and Michael Diamond should be afraid. Very afraid.
Nick Kyrgios’s surrender to an Olympic lynch mob led by a posse of former athletes and media acolytes has exposed hockey’s poster girl and shooting’s troubled genius to unfettered scrutiny.
And, given the microscopic examination of each of the saints up for Rio selection, that cannot be good for either. Assuming, of course, there are no double standards.
We are asked to believe the Kyrgios witch hunt is apparently justifiable when viewed the double prism of unpopular, recalcitrant player from a sport unworthy of lofty Olympic ideals.
The argument is facile and disingenuous.
The bullying campaign — and it was nothing less — aimed at Kyrgios was shameful, even in light of his scandalous sledging of Stan Wawrinka last year.
Since when has selection in the Australian Olympic team been about popularity?
And it was truly about decency, where does due process sit?
If so, those exposed to the swaggering arrogance of our 2012 swimming team would happily never set foot near a pool deck again.
And what of rower Josh Booth’s vandalism along an English high street during the same Games?
Kyrgios clearly is not to everybody’s taste but is entitled to fairness — not just the perception of fairness.
From memory, only Kyrgios and Bernard Tomic have been singled out so stridently by Chiller as being under notice.
Yet Flanagan is under investigation for allegedly covering up a drink-driving charge.
Diamond, who covets flag-bearing duties in Rio, will face court next week on charges of high range drink driving, failing to keep a firearm safe, and handling or using a firearm while under the influence of alcohol.
Are we missing something here?
Given Australian Olympic Committee chef de mission’s contention she would be “appalled and embarrassed” if Kyrgios travelled to Brazil and pulled a tantrum, it begs the question: Where are Flanagan and Diamond positioned on Chiller’s moral compass?
The presence Serena Williams, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal — nominal flag-bearers for Switzerland and Spain — aside, the Kyrgios persecution has predictably become a platform to attack tennis.
We are told, ad nauseam, the sport is full of self-absorbed, socially inept and morally bankrupt parasites.
Not sure how Federer and Nadal, along with a host of thoroughly decent colleagues, fit that bill but evidently tennis is full of irredeemable mugs.
Like Kyrgios, tennis is a soft target.
As one of the original sports at the 1896 Games in Athens, tennis has had a chequered Olympic passage but its return as an exhibition sport in 1968 is directly responsible for the explosion in global participation.
By comparison, cricket remains rooted in a tawdry colonial past — still promoting philosophies not dissimilar to those at the heart of the Kyrgios vilification.
Today’s withdrawal marks the close of an ugly chapter in Australian sport and the true villain in the piece is not necessarily the bloke wearing Nike clobber and a gold chain.
Originally published as Nick Kyrgios ruling himself out of the Rio Olympics is the result of a shameful bullying campaign
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