Nick Kyrgios swaggers into his third-round match against Andy Murray on Saturday overflowing with self-belief – and the backing of John McEnroe, who thinks the young Australian hotshot could be “the No1 player in the world in the next couple of years”.
That is baggage to bear but the kid from Canberra whose mother may still not be sure he is going to make it – “She’s a bit weird like that,” Kyrgios says – is not only comfortable with praise, he revels in it.
Perhaps that is because there has been so much of it since he beat Rafael Nadal at Wimbledon last year, and again when he got the better of Roger Federer in three tie-break sets in Madrid this month.
As he said when asked this week if he was annoyed some people found him arrogant: “It’s not annoying at all. The greatest people in every sport have an unbelievable amount of self-confidence. I think that’s one thing that makes me a good tennis player: I have a lot of belief in myself. You don’t see many 19-year-olds or 20-year-olds beating the greatest of all time.”
As for his hopes in Paris, he added: “I’ve got pretty high expectations for myself. I’ve had some really good results the last couple of weeks. I have belief in my body. I’ve got the metres under my legs. I’ve played a lot of five-set matches now, so I feel confident. I’m carrying some niggles here and there [he retired after seven games against Dominic Thiem in Nice two weeks ago to protect a sore right elbow] but that’s normal. All in all, I’m feeling good, feeling ready. I don’t really mind who I’m playing. At the end of the day, it’s just tennis, another opportunity to go out there and have fun.”
If Kyrgios makes tennis look easy, Murray, for all his talent, sometimes turns it into a mild form of torture, although he beat Kyrgios handily in the quarter-finals in Melbourne in January. On that day, it was the Australian who suffered, in more ways than one.
“At the Australian Open,” Kyrgios said, “my back was really bad. I had to take a couple of months off afterwards but I’m feeling way better than I felt then. If I can make the quarter-finals of the Australian Open with a bad back I can do some special things when healthy. I’m getting good physio every day, managing my load, managing how many serves I hit. I’m giving myself the best chance to go out there and feel comfortable with my body.”
McEnroe expanded on why he thinks Kyrgios might just be “the one” to come through when the old order cracks for good. Part of his upbeat appraisal draws on the similarity he sees between Kyrgios and himself. “I had an earring briefly,” the former world No1 says, “not as big as his. What I see as a similarity is he’s got personality.
“He’s got belief in himself. He brings something, you can feel it on the court. It’s not that we play the same game, the game he plays is unpredictable. He talks a lot, he’s out there expressing himself. I believe he’s got a shot at being the No1 player in the world in the next couple of years, certainly without question top five.”
Murray respects and admires Kyrgios too – although he will leaven that in the heat of battle. “It is so hard to say how good someone can be,” he says. “But, from the young guys, he has had maybe the biggest results at the biggest events. That is a great start. He has always played well in the slams, he has always won matches in them – even when he got a wildcard the first time when he beat Radek Stepanek when he was pretty young. Wimbledon last year was a great run for him, a huge step. And he loves being in those positions.
“But, how good can he be? I have no idea. He is already pretty good. He has had some great wins in some big events and it is just about maintaining that throughout the year in all competitions to build confidence and belief. He is going to be a great player but you never know how great someone can or will be.”
Australia have not had 12 players in this tournament since 1999, and Kyrgios observes: “It’s very exciting. We’ve got six guys in the top 100, which is really good, and a lot of guys in qualies. It’s a positive, because we’re going to keep pushing each other.”
On Wednesday Thanasi Kokkinakis pushed his fellow Australian Bernard Tomic all the way to five sets and out of the tournament, earning a showdown with the best player in the world, Novak Djokovic, in the other quarter on that side of the draw.
Kyrgios’s favourite player on the Tour, though, is Gaël Monfils, admiration underlined in his own high-octane tennis. And in his explanation of why, he reveals much about himself. “He only plays the game because he loves it,” Kyrgios says. “He loves to entertain. He doesn’t worry about what others think. He plays how he wants to play.”
