The stadium lights went out for a few confusing minutes, but the brilliance of Nick Kyrgios lit up Melbourne Arena in the Australian’s 6-2, 7-6 (7-3), 7-6 (7-1) win over Italy’s Lorenzo Sonego in the first round of the Australian Open. It was not a flawless performance by the 23rd seed, but it was energetic and often inspired, and 14 aces added another A$2,800 to the coffers of the country’s bushfire relief effort.
Earlier in the day, Kyrgios’s countryman Thanasi Kokkinakis painted an arresting image of Kyrgios in his years as a tubby child prodigy on the courts of Canberra: “He always had the bomb serve, huge forehand, really good backhand but he wouldn’t move a lick,” Kokkinakis wrote. Those who argue that not much has changed since might have taken heart from Kyrgios’s frequent dashes to the net, and the agility he showed to complement power and unpredictability on Tuesday night in Melbourne.
There is a view that Kyrgios has discovered something bigger than himself leading into this tournament, a motivation that might otherwise be missing. Early in this encounter there was plenty to confirm that theory. Things were uncharacteristically calm in the first set, when a patient and controlled Kyrgios mixed power hitting with subtle touches. He broke in the fifth and seventh games, as Sonego’s serve, usually the bedrock of his game, deserted him. Kyrgios, on the other hand, was ruthless, winning 93% of points on his first serve. He also judged his charges to the net impeccably, maintaining a perfect record from 11 attempts. In 32 minutes Sonego had been shoved firmly onto the back foot.
The contest came to life a little more in the second set, when the going was far tougher for Kyrgios. Briefly, the strain showed. As Sonego held serve at 4-3, the Australian was ranting and raving on account of noise around the stadium. “You know how hard it is to block that out?” Kyrgios barked at the chair umpire. “It’s impossible.”
Moments later the lights went out, and with the circuit broken, Kyrgios was grinning again and regained his composure. It went to a tie break, in which Sonego confronted not only the unpredictable shot-making of his opponent, but a wall of sound from the partisan crowd. In the blink of an eye the Italian’s chance was gone, and Kyrgios had wrapped up the set in 46 minutes.
It was only in the third set that Kyrgios allowed himself the extravagance of his trademark tweeners, some of them almost as ridiculous as the Ken Done quilt fabric that seems to have been used to make his shorts for this tournament. Again, Sonego stuck with him, outclassed and unsupported, but never less than disciplined in the face of unfavourable odds.
In their only previous meeting, 79 minutes of pure entertainment last August in Cincinnati, Kyrgios prevailed but was left with the impression of a “tough competitor”. So it proved again, at least until crunch time.
The third set tie-break followed a familiar pattern: Kyrgios produced a telling ace and crowd-lifting winners, Sonego a double fault and the sort of unforced errors an outmatched player dreads. And that was that. Kyrgios progresses to a round-two encounter with either Pablo Cuevas of Uruguay or Frenchman Gilles Simon, and remains on track to meet world No1 Rafael Nadal in the fourth round.
Afterwards Kyrgios admitted that he walked onto the court feeling much more pressure than in previous Australian Open campaigns, but said his country had bigger concerns right now. “I guess it’s just a perspective thing, isn’t it?” Kyrgios said. “Why am I really getting mad on the tennis court with everything going on?” He also committed himself “100%” to Olympic duties later in the year.
The other point of interest in this match was its location. As in previous years, tournament officials granted Kyrgios his wish to play on Melbourne Arena, the so-called ‘public’ court, accessible to patrons with ground passes, and not the grander Rod Laver Arena, which would have filled just as easily for this match. There is the basic comfort factor for Kyrgios, he says it’s his favourite court in the world, but as he looks around the smaller arena, the faces he sees cheering him on are younger, and dare it be said, a little more like his own than those in the expensive courtside spots over at centre court.
The flipside of that is that in lieu of silent reverence for the glory of tennis, Kyrgios’s fans bring precisely the kind of hyperactive behaviour that easily distracts their enigmatic hero, a point not lost on a frustrated Kyrgios at several stages of this match. This time he put it to one side, and there he was at the end of the match, getting on famously with his old bete noire, John McEnroe, who pledged A$1,000 for every set Kyrgios wins for the remainder of the tournament. Judging by the sly grin on the Australian’s face, it might prove a costly gesture from McEnroe.
