In the head of Kyrgios - and what Andy Murray just does better
Nick Kyrgios (ATP No. 78) messed up a possible final at the Boss Open in Stuttgart again. Andy Murray showed how to do it better.
by Florian Goosmann from Stuttgart
last edit: Jun 11, 2022, 07:48 pm
Actually, it sounded quite reasonable, Nick Kyrgios' new career plan. He left out the hated sand again this year, in the other tournaments he played well and surprisingly without scandal for his standards. And in Stuttgart, the Australian, who is so attached to his homeland, explained that he only wanted to play ten to twelve tournaments a year in the future - but this one correctly.
And for a while he did just that. Kyrgios on grass is always a danger - if only it weren't for his head!
Against Andy Murray in the semifinals? Kyrgios started strong, better than his opponent, the shows with serve from below and passing through the legs (in one point) at 40-0 times outside. When Murray, the stubborn Scot, just couldn't be swayed, Kyrgios got nervous. The self-talk increased and it got more intense, it got louder and ruder, and suddenly it wasn't soli-talk at all.
Kyrgios grumbled about the square ("Broken!"), the lines ("Broken!") and the Hawk-Eye ("Broken!"). He thumped a ball out of the stadium early in the tie-break and earned a booking. He chopped up his racket and got a point deduction. He received a game deduction. And let the match run away relatively at the end.
The five phases of a Kyrgios eruption
There are several stages Kyrgios goes through in a match, and they go something like this:
1) Kyrgios is having fun.
As long as it works and he breaks at some point and his opponent collapses.
2) Kyrgios swears softly.
And that's if it's still going well, but also with the opponent.
3) Kyrgios becomes dissatisfied with everything.
With balls, the court, the racquet, the hawk-eye, the referee, the sun, the wind and the world itself.
4) Kyrgios unleashes his anger.
He destroys racquets or benches and receives warnings, a point deduction and a game deduction.
5) Kyrgios calms down and lets the game run.
He shoots double faults on the other side and hardly reacts to the opponent's serves.
The big problem of the tennis player, it's the damn loneliness, as Andre Agassi described it so beautifully. In tennis, you can only react to yourself, in contrast to a boxer, who can still hit his opponent. The art of tennis is then to find yourself again.
Murray does it
And that's where Andy Murray comes in. He's really no expert at pushing himself with positive self-talk; Just watching Murray for a match is interesting in that he keeps himself busy throughout. Only a few players manage to utter an audible "Fuck!" after a devious first serve. curse to himself, and quite regularly. And otherwise Murray is the master of soliloquy.
During this week in Stuttgart, however, he was once again the master at stopping when it came down to it. In the tiebreaks (Murray played three and won all of them), Murray suddenly cheered himself on with positive words, "Go Andy" was suddenly heard here instead of annoyed grumbling. And playfully he added another level of security. Percent tennis when it counts! Murray has done it these days, and particularly remarkable: in all three sets that ended in a tie-break (against Bublik, against Tsitsipas, against Kyrgios), he wasn't the better player up until then.
On grass, this art is even more important than it already is, the margins on grass are too small, every point can be decisive.
Yes, Kyrgios was unlucky at the end of the first set, several balls actually jumped on his side. But Murray showed his class here too: A ball from Kyrgios doubled the set ball in the first round, but Murray pushed the ball over via a forehand slice. He jumped again at Kyrgios, and he warped.
The match was over after that, even if something like that is never certain in tennis, where the momentum can change quickly. Murray, however, did not allow that, preventing the one spectacular point in the second set that can get you back in the race like Kyrgios.
The final? He deserves it in all respects.
TV NOTE: ServusTV Germany broadcasts all center court matches of the BOSS OPEN live and exclusively on free TV and on ServusTV On.