Aussie bad boy knocks out original one last time

Lleyton Hewitt was once the enfant terrible of Australian tennis. Now he’s a mentor to the likes of Bernard Tomic

NEW YORK— Take that, brat.

Oh no. Wait. Guess we’ll have to take it back instead, all the fans inside the Grandstand Stadium — and doubtless millions others watching on TV Down Under — who were cheering ecstatically for underdog Lleyton Hewitt. Everybody, it seemed, poised to wave buh-bye Bernie, the other Aussie under the bright lights.

Hewitt, in his swansong at Flushing Meadows, had this match in the palm of his sweaty hand, first at 15-40 in Bernard Tomic’s service game, up 5-3 in the fifth set, then serving for the match himself at 5-4.

But the fates — possibly the nerves, even for a veteran like Hewitt — did not allow it. It was Tomic who broke back, then held serve, then broke again to take it an intensely dramatic and hugely entertaining encounter 6-3, 6-2, 3-6, 5-7, 7-5. So there was no last hurrah for Hewitt, as his mini-me son — same outfit, same ball cap turned backwards, his dad’s on-court trademark — looked on from the front row of the player’s family box. Oi-Oi-Oi. There was a man-hug at the net, however, between the last generation and the next.

Maybe party buddies are cheering down in Miami, where Tomic was last month arrested following complaints about a blow-out bash in his $7,000-anight luxury hotel room. Tomic was charged — take a look at his bare-chested mug-shot — for allegedly resisting arrest.

Why is it — just asking — that Australia has turned into a breeding ground for tennis punks?

There’s Nick Kyrgios (bounced) and Thanasi Kokkinakis (retired, cramping), for double instance. And Tomic, perhaps the most capital-T troubled of all the precociously talented young firebrands from the Land of Oz.

Once upon a time, there was also enfant terrible Hewitt. But he’s a wizened up and ripened-down specimen now, at age 34. Indeed, Hewitt has embraced a mentoring role with the beastie boys, including Tomic (though apparently not with great effect), and they’ve turned into a mutual admiration society of two.

Long gone, purportedly forgotten, is the craven disrespect from some six years past when the toxic Tomic camp (coach-father John Tomic, a man of towering temper, was charged in Spain for putting his son’s training partner in the hospital) rejected an offer from Hewitt to practise with him at a tournament where the younger player had failed to qualify.

Tomic was booted off the Davis Cup team in July for a verbal attack against Tennis Australia officials, including Pat Rafter — the same team that Hewitt will lead into the semi-finals versus Britain starting Sept. 18.

All water under the Cooper Creek now, it seems.

“He’s a huge legend for me,” Tomic declared post-match.

“I always looked up to him. For me, it was difficult playing him tonight. It was very, very emotional. It was tough before the match preparing for this.” Master and apprentice. Tomic, whose 22-year-old legs cramped during the match though he soldiered on, had actually been loaned Hewitt’s physiotherapist earlier. And, red-faced from his exertions, Hewitt had only pats on the back from the rival who’d just ousted him from what was his final U.S. Open appearance, a major won in 2001.

“I was serving for the match at 5-3 and I was very, very nervous,” said Tomic. “In the end, I tried my best but it could have gone both ways.’’

Tomic added: “I’m used to Australian crowds being on my side. But they were all on his side. And that’s OK.’’

It was their first head-to-head. They practise together all the time nowadays, have forged a close relationship, but never before faced each other across the net in circumstances that mattered.

“He’s a good guy,” Hewitt insisted at his news conference afterwards. “He’s moving in the right direction. For the last couple of years I’ve gone out of my way to really help him out. So I think (tonight) was awkward for us both.”

The only surviving Australian male singles player left at this Open, Tomic next does battle with Frenchman Richard Gasquet.

Hewitt will retire after the Australian Open in January. Tomic will carry on. And probably carry on misbehaving.

It’s a long road to the gaining of wisdom. Just ask Lleyton, Bernie, one Aussie to another.