Edmund exits early as knee injury returns
Chronic problem raises doubts for Wimbledon Konta now only British hope and targets last 16
Kyle Edmund, the British No1, is a contradictory soul. When the force is with him, he plays with unusual fire and ferocity. Yet he is also an introverted character with a fragile physique, which let him down yesterday in Paris.
Edmund should have beaten Pablo Cuevas, Uruguay’s chief tennis export, who started the match ranked 17 places below him at No47. Instead he played as if his mind was somewhere else. We only discovered the explanation midway through the third set: his chronic knee injury had returned.
As he trailed 7-6, 6-3, 2-1, Edmund called the trainer to the court. A brief conversation ensued, with no actual physical examination, before he retired from the match. There is an outside chance that his knee could threaten his participation at Wimbledon in a month’s time, but as Edmund was reluctant to divulge any specifics in the interview room, it is hard to tell.
“There’s no exact formula to fix things or get things better,” said Edmund, who has been suffering from soreness in that joint – on and off – since he pulled out of the Paris Masters in October. “You just have to do the best you can to get it better.
“It kind of becomes part of your life, waking up with something a little bit sore, so you get on with it. In a weird way you take enjoyment by pushing through it and achieving things.”
If we flash back to the end of 2018, the word from Edmund’s management was that an MRI scan had proved inconclusive and that a little rest should sort out the issue. The knee was just one of a number of health problems that have afflicted him in the past year, including the recurring viruses that led him to have his tonsils removed in November.
In an attempt to resolve some of these vulnerabilities, Edmund has been working with a former Navy Seal, motivational speaker and ultra-marathon runner, David Goggins. The intention was to boost his mental and physical strength – two qualities that Goggins showed off when he set the world record for the most pull-ups performed in 24 hours. But these situations require sensitive handling, and “pushing through” – to use Edmund’s words – is not always the best course.
In the short term, yesterday’s defeat will cost Edmund 45 points, dropping him close to the edge of the top 30, and placing his position among Wimbledon’s seeded players in doubt. In the so-called “Race to London” – which only counts results from the 2019 season – he stands just inside the top 70. Fellow Britons Cameron Norrie and Dan Evans both rank above him.
Another concern relates to Edmund’s performance in best-offive-set matches – and particularly his tendency to tail away. This was the 14th time that he had fallen two sets behind. He has yet to claim even a set from that position.
Edmund’s exit left Johanna Konta as the last Briton standing at the French Open, in both a literal and figurative sense. She will play for a place in the last 16 today against world No 46 Viktoria Kuzmova, a 21-year-old Slovakian who takes a more cerebral approach to life than most professional athletes.
“I have a book with me now,” said Kuzmova, who is studying for an international-relations degree at a university in Bratislava. “I’m reading Hamlet for the fifth time. Shakespeare is my favourite but I also love some not-so-famous authors. For example I love Rupi Kaur, who wrote The Sun and Her Flowers and Milk and Honey.”
The pick of the matches yesterday was Victoria Azarenka’s run-in with world No1 Naomi Osaka. Surprisingly scheduled on the second stadium, Court Suzanne Lenglen, this turned into a real barn burner after Azarenka had sprinted out to a 4-0 first-set lead. As in the first round, Osaka only switched on when she appeared to be on the brink of elimination, winning 10 of the next 12 games after slipping a set and 4-2 behind.
“I have this mindset that I feel like I can win if it gets down to the
wire,” Osaka said. “If I have to break a person, I feel like I have the ability to do that. So I probably shouldn’t wait until the last minute.”
The only downside to this match – which Osaka eventually won 4-6, 7-5, 6-3 – was the 11-minute bathroom break that interrupted proceedings after the second set, flattening the crowd’s excitement.
Both women left the court, and Osaka admitted: “When I went to the bathroom to change, I was freaking out, because I didn’t want to get a code violation. My hands were shaking. So when I came back and saw she wasn’t back, I just had a little bit of time to calm down.”