I’m A Celeb 2018: Bernard Tomic threatens to quit jungle

HE’S known for his cocky attitude. But tennis star Bernard Tomic isn’t coping with jungle life and is already threatening to quit I’m A Celeb.

BERNARD Tomic isn’t coping with jungle life.

The controversial tennis player has threatened to quit I’m A Celebrity … Get Me Out Of Here! just a couple of days into the fourth season of the popular reality show.

“I don’t think I can do it,” Tomic said.

“This is not the real world. This is the jungle. This is so different, not what I expected.”

It is a very different Tomic to the confident and cocky, brazenly outspoken tennis player Australia has come to know throughout his career.

Bernard Tomic had to pull out of the ‘Bridge Too Far’ tucker trial. Picture: Network Ten

Prior to going into the South African jungle to compete on the reality show, Tomic said he would do his best to get through challenges.

“I am scared of everything,” he said.

“I am scared of heights and spiders and snakes and cockroaches. I am probably not the best person with anything. It will be mind over matter. I think the mind is going to have to be powerful for me.”

But last night he had to pull out of the ‘Bridge Too Far’ tucker trial, during which he had to wear goggles that made everything appear upside down as he attempted an obstacle course suspended over a cliff.

The Bridge Too Far trial proved too much for Bernard Tomic.

“What I had to do today, I’ve never experienced anything like that in my life,” he said.

“I came here to find myself, to find who I am and like, I obviously lost myself the last year and what I needed to do.

“There is just no point in me being here anymore and wasting unnecessary time for myself because I need to be out there playing and competing.

“I feel bad because I just met bunch of people and you guys are super fun and super cool and I was really excited to meet him (Anthony Mundine). It is not the food or any of that; it is just my whole perception of life. I just wasn’t expecting all this. I am just not coping well.”

Tomic took much of the last year off tennis in what he said was a well-earned and much needed break from sport.

The tennis star went into the jungle with high hopes but is now having doubts. Picture: Nigel Wright.

“My headspace has not been good in the last year,” he told fellow contestant Jackie Gillies and Mundine.

“Coming here right now I have done five things in my life that I’ve never done; I’ve never jumped off a plane, I’ve never had seven snake bites, I’ve never camped, I’ve never been around people like this and I’ve never done the stuff that I’ve done today. I was 200 metres off a cliff and then I was upside down with these goggles, it was the worst eight minutes of my life.”

Bernard Tomic, on left, says his head space isn’t so good. Picture: Network Ten

Tomic vowed to “sleep on it” while his fellow celebrity campmates rallied behind him.

“He puts so much pressure on himself and when he doesn’t succeed, I think that mounts up to more emotional distress,” Real Housewives of Melbourne star Gillies said.

“It takes a lot of balls to come out and say ‘I am struggling, this is not what I thought it would be’. We haven’t seen that side to Bernard and I think that is a really open dialogue.”

A man of few words, Mundine also supported Tomic.

“I definitely want Bernard to stay in camp. I have always been a fan of his tennis and I’m just starting to get to know him as a person so I would love for him to stay and try and fight through what he is going through so I will do everything in my power to try and help him do that.”

* The journalist is in South Africa as a guest of Channel Ten covering I’m A Celebrity ... Get Me Out Of Here!

Originally published as I’m A Celeb 2018: Bernard Tomic threatens to quit jungle