It says a lot about Nick Kyrgios that, when it comes to the second services, it is likely that the Australian tennis star will be better remembered not by the best of 143 mph as sent to Rafael Nadal in Wimbledon in 2019, but for a comment made in The social comment in the tournament that took place in the tournament that sent more media during the US open last year.
Under a photograph that shows it with the ex -girlfriend Anna Kalinskaya, a 26 -year -old muscovite who occupies 18 years in the world, Kyrgios wrote: 'Second service'.
Since Kalinskaya was at that time in a relationship with Jannik Sinner, whom the Canberran has repeatedly pointed out since it was learned that Sinner failed two drug tests last spring, the comment was widely interpreted as a vulgar blow to the couple.
While Kyrgios refused to prepare beyond denying the comment, he was abusive, the 29 -year -old has been considerably closer in his feelings about Sinner, who faces an arbitration court for the sports audience in April in which the World Agency Anti -doping will argue should be excluded from the game for up to two years.
Since last August, when he realized that Sinner had avoided a prohibition after small amounts of anabolic steroid clostebol had been found in his system five months before, Kyrgios has taken repeated excavations in the number 1 of the Italian world.
Having initially described the decision not to prohibit Sinner as “ridicule”, insisting that it should have “gone for two years”, then described the management of the case of Sinner, and the subsequent revelation that IGA Swiatek, the world of the Women No 2, had had, had a test failed after taking contaminated medications, such as 'horrible' and 'disgusting for our sport'.
Meanwhile, Sinner, a quieter and more underestimated character, has largely maintained his advice, refusing to reach Kyrgios ships, and much less discuss his private life. When asked how he blocked criticism before his campaign in Melbourne, he avoided the problem with the same agility that brings to court.
“I don't think I have to answer this, to be honest,” Sinner said. 'I haven't done anything wrong. That's why I'm still here. That's why I'm still playing. I don't want to answer what Nick or other players said.
Kalinskaya, seen here on the left, was previously in a brief relationship with Australian player Nick Kyrgios, on the right, who was sentenced by this comment in a photo of the couple
Jannik Sinner, on the left, the Italian world No 1, shared a celebration kiss with his girlfriend Anna Kalinskaya after winning the US Open. Uu. For the first time last September
Neither Kalinskaya, seen here in an instant Instagram, has nor Sinner
Many will find Kyrgios attempt to portray himself as a moral crusader in the war against deeply unpleasant drugs. In February 2023, he admitted to having assaulted Chiara Passari, a ex -girlfriend, avoiding a criminal conviction only after a Canberra magistrate considered that his actions “a single act of stupidity or frustration.” During a match against Stan Wawrinka in Montreal in 2015, he publicly revealed that his compatriot Thanasi Kokkinakis had slept with Wawrinka's girlfriend.
The years between these two incidents brought an extensive catalog of fines, controversy and minor crimes, including a disqualification in Rome in 2019, when he launched a chair on the entire court, and a series of spike comments about his contemporaries, including Novak Djokovic , with whom he has formed a close friendship, and Nadal.
Only this week, Kyrgios entered the debate after Goncalo Oliveira of Venezuela was provisionally suspended by a positive test of methamphetamine. “The steroids are fine, but this is wild,” he subtitled an Instagram post.
In summary, there is nothing new about Kyrgios, whose classification has collapsed to 1,093 after a series of injuries in the last two years, creating waves.
But although it has barely established itself as the moral conscience of sport, in the past Kyrgios has often expressed remorse after firing from the lip. His feelings about Sinner seem more entrenched. The last mockery without Kyrgios complexes arrived last weekend, when Sinner made a first foray into the world of YouTube.
A nine -minute video showed glimpse behind the scene of the last six days of the triumphant campaign of the Triumphant Australian Open of Sinner last month, drawing its march to a third Grand Slam title through a series of recovery and recovery sessions Practice, a period behind the steering wheel of a golf cart, and even at the time he collected a full size replica of the Norman Brookes Challenge Cup.
“People only see what we do in court,” he reflects Sinner towards the end of the images, “but out of the court is what really matters, where you build your life for the future.”
In a typically a separate caustic, Kyrgios offered a too literal interpretation of that feeling.
'Can you give us a behind the scene of what happened a year ago?' The Australian wrote in X. 'asking a friend'.
Sinner has been in a relationship with Tennis Star Anna Kalinskaya since the beginning of last year
It is not entirely up with a Jimmy Connors that stir the fingers that crosses the network to face John Mcenroe in Rosemont, Illinois, in 1982, it is true that it was an equivalent of the digital age and, naturally, served to deepen the curiosity about what is behind Kyrgios beef. With sinner.
The obvious starting point in any consideration of that theme is the characteristic habit of the former Wimbledon finalist of insinuating in any problem related to the game, a trend that only exacerbated two years outside knees with knee injuries, the foot and the doll.
However, the inclination to attribute the verbal onslaught of Kyrgios against the sinner to a combination of natural natural frustration and personal frustration is attenuated by its appearance during that period as a commentator and insightful and eloquent television analyst.
Very often Brattle and alienating racket in hand, Kyrgios emerged, by almost universal assent, as a completely more entertaining and pleasant figure to take the microphone. So why will that image be torpedoed by getting involved in an unnecessary and unilateral match?
It is difficult to avoid the impression that Kyrgios's mood against Sinner, which began when the International Tennis Integrity Agency found that the Italian had no failure or negligence “for the ingestion of a prohibited substance after a massage with the naked hands of His physio is more of a personal nature.
“Ridiculo: whether accidental or planned,” Kyrgios wrote on social networks after the announcement. 'They try you twice with a prohibited substance (steroids) … you should go for two years. His performance was improved. Massage cream … yes, pleasant.
He questioned his reasons before returning from his long absence of injuries in Brisbane last December, Kyrgios accused Sinner of missing the respect for the sport and offered a fulminating evaluation of a statement from the Italian camp that “less than one billion one gram of a gram of a gram of a gram of a gram of a gram of Closing the player's body was detected.
“Never in my life would try to drug this sport,” Kyrgios said.
'Going through an injury as I happened, obviously there are things out there that could accelerate healing, help me return to the main level, help my recovery. There are so many things that are prohibited in our sport that I could have been doing to recover faster.
Pointing out that his compatriot Max Purcell had been provisionally suspended after admitting a violation of the anti -doping rules, Kyrgios also accused the authorities of double ratings, which suggests that the high -profile stars such as Sinner and Swiatek were treated more lightly.
That is a position that has been renowned for players throughout the sport, from the ancient No 1 of the world such as Djokovic and Simona Halep to Tara Moore of Great Britain, whose classification entered free fall when it served a 19 -month suspension for a test failed that was later awarded. have been caused by eating contaminated meat.
However, none of those mentioned has continued to fix the sinner in the same degree as Kyrgios, and the sensation persists among many in the sport that the apparent antipathy of the Australian is based on the relationship of Italian with Kalinskaya.
“This is just a personal revenge,” said American tennis analyst Jon Wertheim last month on Andy Roddick's podcast. 'There is a woman involved here, who is also a player. Sinner has been relentlessly intimidated for months and months and has not responded.
'There are so many things here, but it seems to have anything to do with good faith concerns about doping.
'(Kyrgios) did not even seem to understand the doping protocols and the context to begin with, which leads me to conclude that all this is only … Against a player who is now dating an ex -girlfriend and nothing more.'
Time will say, in case it is speculated that Sinner and Kalinskaya have divided well founded.
The relationship was subject to scrutiny in the last months of last year after Sinner commented in a magazine interview that having a girlfriend “is something that makes you feel good or makes you feel bad.” Subsequently, the rumors swirled that the couple had stopped continuing on social networks.
Forced from the Australian Open at the 11th hour after contracting a virus, Kalinskaya was absent from the Sinner box while collecting its third important title in Melbourne, a marked contrast with the scenes that followed the final of Us Open last September, When the couple shared a kiss after the Italian victory over Taylor Fritz.
Like Sinner, Kalinskaya has refused to be attracted to the controversy, but it seemed to give Kyrgios the cold shoulder when the two crossings crossed behind the scene in Melbourne Park.
There seems to be little love lost everywhere, and former Wimbledon champion, Marion Bartoli, is among those who feel enough is enough.
“Kyrgios lives and breathes for this, to make more and more provocative statements,” Bartoli told the RMC Sport French television channel.
'This is a player who was able to say absolute horrors to Stan Wawrinka, who is one of the most educated, most loved and most respected players on a tennis court, in a 1000 masters in the middle of a game.
'We don't even know what is going through his head.
'With all his provocative statements, after a while, you will simply get fed up. It is enough.
Few would not agree.