Sook Nick Kyrgios can’t win the Australian Open
Nick Kyrgios is too much of a sook to win the Australian Open.
Nick Kyrgios is too much of a sook to win the Australian Open.
Now, I’m not saying he’s a horrible human. I’m saying bravo for using two of his favourite devices, a prolific Twitter account and venomous serve, to raise thousands of dollars for bushfire victims. I’m saying bravo for making a contribution to society more valuable than winning a few matches at the ATP Cup. And I’m saying bravo for getting the fundraising ball rolling in Australian sport to the extent that Shane Warne has kissed his baggy green cap goodbye for a million glorious dollars.
I’m saying a sincere bravo for all the heart he has shown in those areas. But I’m also saying when it comes to the nitty gritty of Kyrgios’s day job, of trying to win a major, he’s no closer than he was five years ago.
Why? Because he has not learned his lessons. He’s going round in self-sabotaging circles in this perplexing career of his. While Alex de Minaur advances in leaps and bounds because he’s constantly striving to improve, continuously modifying his game and psyche like a motoring enthusiast tinkering with his car in the garage until late in the night, Kyrgios keeps hammering away with the same old stuff. And getting the same results.
His slouching, complaining demeanour against Roberto Bautista Agut in Australia’s loss to Spain on Saturday night (“this is bullshit, I’m done, I’m done”) is what we’ve seen and heard a hundred times before. A lot of pre-match promise has yet again gone kaput.
Threatening to quit after a let-cord call has shown that nothing has changed. The ruling from the umpire has not been bullshit. Kyrgios has blown it out of proportion.
Tennis can bring out the darkest corners of an athletes’ personality and for Kyrgios, it’s the tendency to throw in the towel right when he needs to fight. He plays the victim when he is nothing of the sort.
The Australian Open is a dogfight. There are no short cuts to winning seven matches over two weeks. We can confidently predict how his Open will go. The blockbuster early wins. The suggestions that he’s a changed man. The prediction that this is his year. And then an on-court sook during an avoidable defeat.
He’s had a decent ATP Cup, no doubt, but not even he sounds confident of converting that into a serious charge at the Open.
Asked if he can take positives from the team format to the lonelier arena of a major, Kyrgios has replied: “Well, no. Because these boys aren’t with me on the bench when I’m playing individual. I don’t know what it is. When I’m playing for myself, I find it hard to get up. My motivation levels are pretty low most of the time. Something about these guys and playing for them brings it out in me. I just love — I’m a team player. If I would have (been as focused in individual events), I probably would have had a very different four years of my career, six.”
De Minaur’s first two sets against Rafael Nadal were out of this world. His real turning point?
He was frustrated in his quarter-final loss to Dan Evans, in allowing the Brit to have the most powerful on-court presence.
Most of the come-ons, most of the fist pumps and most of the aggressive body language came from Evans. De Minaur decided that wouldn’t happen again.
Which is why he was in such a frenzy for the doubles against the Brits, and even more so against Nadal. He copied the Spaniard’s boxing-style dancing on the spot before the coin toss. He sprinted onto the court after the changes of ends. He screamed in Spanish, looking possessed enough to speak in tongues. He constantly hollered “Vamos”. He hit the cover off the ball while Hewitt urged him: “Raise the bar, mate. Raise the bar.”
It wasn’t possible for the bar to go any higher. His first two sets in the 4-6 7-5 6-1 defeat revealed how great he can be. He’s learned again and tinkered again and done what he wants to do. Improve.
“I feel like the mindset and the intensity I brought out, especially my last two matches, which was the doubles and now this match against Rafa, I felt like I was on another level of just intensity and how fired up I got,” he said.
“That’s sort of the standard I’ve got to keep on bringing.
“Obviously I knew the task at hand. I knew that if I wanted to hurt Rafa I was going to have to play like that. It’s a tough one, because I felt like I was very close. Probably a few points in the second set. You know, I just went until my legs couldn’t go anymore.”
That will be the challenge for de Minaur. Keeping it up. Not every Robbie Williams performance is Knebworth. It’s one thing for de Minaur to red-line against the world No 1 when Ken Rosewall Arena is shaking with atmosphere and you’re so full of adrenaline and purpose and support that you play like you have never played before.
There were stages where de Minaur did a Nadal on Nadal, hitting bigger forehands, bringing more intensity, orchestrating the pace and tempo of the match to his liking. It was astounding stuff, but how does he do that in a regular tournament when there’s about 50 people watching?
Nadal’s backhand was diabolical, rigid like a bodybuilder trying to do yoga, but with Kyrgios watching from courtside, Nadal provided a lesson in what it takes to be as successful as him. If Kyrgios hasn’t learned about fighting from watching de Minaur versus Nadal, if the light bulb hasn’t gone off while seeing what the right attitude can do, he never will. He commends de Minaur’s competitiveness while not trying to replicate it. Which is nonsensical.
“I’m red-lining for a lot of that match,” de Minaur said. “A couple of missed balls here and there, and he ended up just being too good. He changed his game plan a bit more. He started to step up in the court a bit more and not let me dictate as much. Therefore, I felt like I had to push a bit more, and that’s when the mistakes sort of came.
“For me to play the match, I’ve got to play a very aggressive game. Ultimately I’m just so proud of what the whole team has been able to do. We have come out here, we have been in one of the toughest groups in the whole ATP Cup, and we have been able to come out, get three wins, make it to the semi-final, and our team is as strong as ever. We’ve got everyone’s back. Everyone in the team just left it all out there. I couldn’t be prouder of what this team has done.”
De Minaur is top seed for this week’s Adelaide International. Kyrgios will practise in Melbourne and take part in the bushfire charity night on Rod Laver Arena on Wednesday. He will be the life of the party. He will play trick shots, crack jokes, make light of his rifts with Nadal and Novak Djokovic, bring smiles and laughter and money to a lot of faces.
He may very well have a heart the size of Kangaroo Island for the downtrodden, for children, for animals, for every victim of the fires. He will be the perfect host for the evening. Again, bravo.
But come the Australian Open, when he gets back to his day job, what will change from all his other Australian Open implosions? Probably nothing. He doesn’t have to improve if he doesn’t want to. He can lead a happy celebrity life without a Norman Brookes Challenge Cup on the mantelpiece.
But unless the sooking stops, he is going to miss out on the sporting miracle inside him.
More Coverage
Australian Open’s call on shock US Open mixed doubles decision
The Australian Open has made a decisive call as to whether it will follow in the footsteps of the US Open and relegate mixed doubles to a pre-tournament sideshow.
Hunter reveals comeback plan, 10 months after brutal injury struck
Struck down by a brutal injury off the back of a career-best run, an Aussie tennis ace has revealed her plans to return to the court later this month.