BECOMING A FATHER

Q

You were 23 years old when your daughter Zara was born in December 2015. How has becoming a father changed you?

A

In a million ways. Before I had my daughter, I could barely look after myself and now I am looking after a tiny being which is crazy. It’s such a strange feeling to look at your own child and see your own baby photos and see yourself in that child.

It’s such a crazy good feeling and seeing their little personality traits. It’s made things difficult tennis-wise but it has been a blessing other than that.

Q

You’re perhaps best known for giving up your place in the final of an Australian Open wildcard playoff tournament to be there for Zara’s birth. Would you do the same again?

A

Yeah of course, zero regrets with that one. It was shocking timing. On the back of a newspaper a couple of days later was something like “$45,000 baby” (he could have earnt that much just by making it to the first round of the Australian Open). I didn’t like seeing that too much, it kind of reminded me. But to be honest, when Zara was born, I didn’t think about the match or the playoff for five or six days straight. I was just buzzing being a dad.

Being a dad has outweighed anything else in my career. So even though we don’t see eye-to-eye now, one thing tennis brought me was Zara.

Q

You said in October “when you have a relationship breakdown while you have a child, things get very difficult”. How is life now?

A

I had Zara over Christmas which was awesome. She is definitely a daddy’s girl so she just needs to be with me whenever I have got her.