Aussie great likens 'car crash' Nick Kyrgios to Anna Kournikova
Australian tennis great Pat Cash has likened watching Nick Kyrgios play to watching a car crash, and compared the 24-year-old’s career to that of Anna Kournikova.
In an interview with the BBC, Cash said people kept tuning in to Kyrgios’ matches because it was impossible to predict what might unfold.
Cash’s comments come in the wake of a typically controversial first round match for Kyrgios, who took a reporter to task after the game over a question about his heated rival, Rafael Nadal.
Kyrgios defeated fellow Australian Jordan Thompson in five sets on Tuesday night (AEST), booking a match-up with Nadal in the second round.
“I think Nick is a talent. People will want to watch because you don’t know if he is going to hit the ball in, hit the ball at the umpire, kill the opponent, kill an umpire or kill a racquet or whatever it is going to be,” Cash told the BBC.
“But people also look at car crashes.
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“You look at the side of the road and you can’t help but watch.
“I don’t want him to be super talented and watched just for the sake of being a spectacle, like Anna Kournikova: highly paid but never really doing anything and never really getting there.
“Is he a male Kournikova? Kournikova did win a grand slam in doubles, but you know what I mean?
“He is a like a show around it but never quite reaches his potential.”
Showdown with Thompson produces fireworks
Fans on Show Court 3 were treated to the full box and dice as Kyrgios mostly treated Tuesday's match with his former junior doubles partner as an exhibition - at least until tensions rose deep in the third set.
Both players received code violations and both repeatedly complained of an overly chatty courtside fan, while Kyrgios erupted after a line judge incorrectly called one of his serves a fault.
"Is he going to be fined? Why not? I'm playing for hundreds of thousands of dollars and he's making mistakes like that," Kyrgios fumed at the chair umpire.
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He then told his box: "they are idiots, f***ing idiots".
But the outburst seemed to spark Kyrgios to life, with the former quarter-finalist responding with successive aces on the way to taking the pivotal third set in an epic tiebreaker.
"When I have a lot of energy, I play well," he said.
"My emotions tend to come out a little bit more.
"When I'm calm, I probably don't play as unpredictable, probably don't entertain as much. It's trying to find that balance."
