They remain quite contrasting: Nadal the potential maximizer; Kyrgios the flickering flame. Nadal is voluntary, sometimes heavy, betwee...
They remain quite contrasting: Nadal the potential maximizer; Kyrgios the flickering flame. Nadal is voluntary, sometimes heavy, between services and points. Kyrgios plays as if he has a plane to catch. Nadal has never thrown an angry racket in his professional career; Kyrgios kicked off his brace on Thursday, the second time after losing the match, 7-6(0), 5-7, 6-4. The racket bounced off the court and flew towards the head of a ball boy standing near the back wall, who dodged it.
Kyrgios, booed as he left the field on Thursday, has already been suspended by the men’s tour once in 2016 and placed on probation a second time in 2019 for misconduct. He faces another penalty after Thursday’s game, and the tour would be wise to quell the players’ tantrums more convincingly. Last month, Alexander Zverev made four hits on an umpire’s chair, narrowly missing the umpire, in Acapulco, Mexico, and received no further suspensions after being kicked out of the tournament.
“When you allow players to do things, you don’t know when the line is, and that’s a tricky thing,” Nadal said.
The Spaniard is now 6-3 against Kyrgios, who for all his obvious gifts is yet to advance past the quarter-finals of a Grand Slam singles tournament or win a Masters 1000 title.
Nadal is one of the great champions of any sport and once victory was assured and the press conference was over, he took a few more moments in front of the TV to watch more of the Alcaraz game and look ahead to Saturday and beyond. .
“It’s great, honestly, to have such a star from my country,” Nadal said. “Because for tennis fans, we will continue to enjoy an incredible player who is fighting for the most important titles for the next few years, I don’t know how long. Many years.
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