Grand Slam doubles icon Todd Woodbridge says he wouldn’t be doing what Nick Kyrgios is doing now because criticizing top stars such as Jannik Sinner and Iga Swiatek is only putting more pressure on him to deliver.
While preparing to kick off his post-surgery comeback, the 2022 Wimbledon regularly criticized the top-ranked ATP player and the WTA world No. 2 over their failed doping tests.
While in both cases it was determined that the contamination was to blame and that Sinner and Swiatek bore no fault or negligence for what happened, Kyrgios pretty much thinks those were typical double standard cases.
Speaking to media in Brisbane last week, the 29-year-old ripped the two high-profile doping cases as “disgusting” for tennis.
In one of his interviews, the Australian even said he would like to face the Italian at the Australian Open so he could try to turn every crowd member against the world No. 1 and make it an absolute riot.
Woodbridge on Kyrgios’ criticism of Sinner, Swiatek
“As a former athlete, I would never want to put more pressure on myself, that’s probably putting more pressure on his own self to have to perform,” the former 22-time Grand Slam doubles winner said, via The Times of India.
“If that (Jannik vs Nick) were to play out, it would be interesting viewing. Nick has been out of the game for a long time (almost two years), which is going to be a difficult thing for him.
“I hope he hasn’t set his expectations too high because it’s going to take time to get back to the level that he was playing at before that.”
In his first singles match, Kyrgios competed pretty well but ultimately fell just short to Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard, who won 7-6 (2) 6-7 (4) 7-6 (3).
Following the match, the former world No. 13 revealed his wrist was in pain and cast doubt on his Australian Open participation by openly hinting that he may not be ready for the best-of-five-sets matches.
Tennis World USA