Stefanos Tsitsipas hurt his father in a remarkable mid-match meltdown during his clash with Australia’s Nick Kyrgios at the ATP Cup. The Greek captain, Apostolos Tsitsipas, who coaches the 21-year-old, was caught by Tsitsipas’s angry racket swipe as he reacted to losing the opening set on a tie-break in Brisbane.
Tsitsipas Sr reacted with shock and moved to sit further away from his son, with a bruise visible on his arm. The world No 6 was hit with a penalty point and given a warning by the umpire as well as a talking-to from his mother, Julia Apostoli.
Tsitsipas joked afterwards that he had been “grounded” by his father. “Maybe I’ll [have to] stay in my room for three days,” said the chastised player. “It happened accidentally,” he said in response to journalists’ questions after the match which he lost to Kyrgios, for once a picture of control down the other end, 7-6 (7), 6-7 (3), 7-6 (5).
“I didn’t mean to do it and straight away forgot about it and moved on from there,” he added. “It happens. I wasn’t aiming to do that, it’s just that it went out of control, unfortunately.”
Kyrgios, who has been part of his share of controversies on court, said: “I don’t think he meant it as well. I don’t think you should be giving it too much attention or looking too far into it to be honest. I’ve done some stupid things as well in the heat of the moment, so it was obviously an accident.”
The Australian had fallen on his back after a final backhand winner down the line as the home nation, who were already through to the quarter-finals, maintained their perfect record. In the last eight, Australia will face Great Britain, who had a helping hand from Belgium in winning Group C.
Canada are in a similar position following a 2-1 victory over Germany. Jan-Lennard Struff defeated Félix Auger-Aliassime 6-1, 6-4 but Alexander Zverev’s miserable tournament continued with a 6-2, 6-2 loss to Denis Shapovalov and the young Canadians joined forces to win the deciding doubles.
Russia were convincing winners of Group D thanks to a 3-0 victory over Norway while defeat by Italy meant the USA finished the competition with a 0-3 record.
