Kyrgios is not in such good nick!
Kyrgios has plan to get over injury at Queen’s
Asked how he would be spending the next few days after his injury withdrawal from the Aegon Championships, Nick kyrgios gave a threeword answer.
‘ dog and Fox,’ replied the Australian, raising a smile while referring to the landmark pub in Wimbledon Village, not far from where he is billeted.
Whether being mischievous or not, he is unlikely to bump into kyle edmund there, even though the British No 2 lives down the road and may also have time on his hands.
Hanging out in the local boozer is not the style of the diligent edmund, who followed kyrgios out of the Queen’s Club singles event in different circumstances.
He was beaten 7-6, 4-6, 6-4 by the outstanding 18-year-old Canadian prospect denis shapovalov, currently ranked 193, who came through qualifying.
Their encounter ended some- what less spectacularly than last time they met, which was in February’s davis Cup tie in Ottawa. There the teenage southpaw was defaulted after smashing a ball into the face of the umpire, albeit unintentionally.
This time it ended more with a whimper than a bang, edmund unable to recover from sending down two double faults as he served to stay in the match at 4-5 in the deciding set.
Unusually for a British-reared player, edmund is happier on the clay than the grass. Yet he would still have expected to get through this, especially as he was winning comfortably when the normally well-mannered shapovalov had his meltdown four months ago.
earlier in the day, kyrgios had pulled out after losing his first-set tiebreak 7-3 to American donald Young, having slipped on the fresh grass at 4- 4 and aggravated the hip injury which required an injection two weeks ago. The Australian did not seem unduly alarmed, saying: ‘There are worse things in the world than a guy slipping playing tennis. I’m sure I’ll live.’
He still expects to play at Wimbledon, where he would be considered an outside contender. saying he has no plans to undergo a scan, he added: ‘I’d play Wimbledon if I was injured pretty bad anyway. I will be playing for sure. I have been playing with a sore hip for a long time.
‘I felt it was painful and I started feeling it when I was walking and landing on my serve. It’s exactly what I was feeling in Paris.’
He did not attempt to blame the surface on the newly expanded centre court, which had its usual first- day lushness: ‘It was obviously new, pretty slick. I expected it,’ he said.
At least edmund will not require a wildcard for Wimbledon, the first batch of which will be decided upon today and which offer a minimum £35,000 to the recipients.
There are not many options among GB men and two names likely to be discussed today are James Ward, coming back from a long- term injury, and Marcus Willis, coming back from a longterm human interest story.
Ward, whose stalwart service to Britain’s davis Cup team is in his favour, plays French qualifier Julien Benneteau at lunchtime — early enough for the result to be taken into consideration at this afternoon’s Wimbledon meeting.
Andy Murray faces British No 4 Aljaz Bedene.