The brat lets rip!
Kyrgios rants at ref as he loses to Berdych
GRIGOR DIMITROV was the long-term boyfriend of Maria Sharapova and now he can be found on the arm of Lewis Hamilton’s ex, Nicole Scherzinger. Nick Kyrgios is the flamboyant anti-hero with a golden right arm tipped for greatness, if he can ever keep his temper under control.
Both are supremely talented but their Australian Open exits at the hands of Roger Federer and Tomas Berdych are indicative of how the coming generation still cannot find a way past their elders and betters.
So many hopes in Australia focus on Kyrgios, but he fell to Berdych with a bizarre wave of invective directed at British umpire James Keothavong. ‘ You’re a terrible referee,’ he told the official when shaking hands after a 6-3, 6-4, 1-6, 6-4 defeat.
Keothavong’s only crime was to be in the chair when Kyrgios claimed to be distracted by music floating over from the nearby Melbourne Cricket Ground where Kevin Pietersen was guiding the Melbourne Stars into the Big Bash Final.
The official even offered to stop the match to investigate the source of the offending distraction. The sound was faint but it was enough to draw histrionics from the 20-yearold. ‘Am I hearing things? It’s a circus,’ declared Kyrgios in full brat mode.
‘I didn’t feel he controlled the match very well,’ said Kyrgios of the umpire, unreasonably.
The deadpan Berdych ignored it all and will now face Spaniard Roberto Bautista Agut in the fourth round. While the tournament will be less colourful for the Australian’s departure, there are no ranking points for acting the clown.
Likewise, by the time Federer faces Belgium’s David Goffin in the last 16, Dimitrov’s contribution to the event will be long forgotten. The great Swiss will be going for his 301st Grand Slam victory when he plays No 15 seed Goffin, a testament to his insatiable appetite for victories.
By now it had been thought Dimitrov would be challenging the likes of Federer and Andy Murray, who was due to play his third-round match at 8am today against Portugal’s Joao Sousa.
The Bulgarian has all the attributes to succeed but, at the age of 24, his ranking hovers around the 30-mark and his 2014 Wimbledon quarter-final win over Murray remains the high water mark of his career.
Perhaps he just lacks the sheer hunger of someone like Federer, who is already into four figures when it comes to career wins. Dimitrov reached the Final of the ATP event in Sydney last week, encouraging thoughts that he could make a strong run in Melbourne, but he only really challenged Federer in the second set of a 6-4, 3-6, 6-1, 6-4 defeat.
Asked about how he achieves the kind of career balance younger players like Dimitrov and Kyrgios might aspire to, Federer said: ‘It’s about the tennis at the end of the day. It’s nice to have nice deals, a great image and all that stuff. But at the end of the day, I’m a tennis player. I think then you can choose how you want to handle yourself on and off the court.’
His 300th Grand Slam win puts him 90 ahead of Novak Djokovic, who will now meet France’s No 14 seed Gilles Simon. The Serb showed he has not been distracted by questions involving a match long ago in Paris by beating Andreas Seppi 6-1, 7-5, 7-6.
The only awkwardness for the world No 1 yesterday was when he was asked why he had not appeared in a tribute video shown to honour Lleyton Hewitt, like other top players including Murray. It turned out he had recorded one but it had been left out by mistake.
They also mis-spelt Djokovic’s name at a charity event prior to the tournament. This is starting to look a careless way to treat a five-time champion.
Sharapova claimed her 600th career victory and she and Serena Williams are now just o ne match a way from a quarter-final meeting in a repeat of last year’s Final.