Tennis

Wimbledon: Kyrgios sparks controversy en route to first round win

Last year’s Wimbledon stunner Nick Kyrgios managed to made a great start in the All England Club with a straight-set win over Argentinean Diego Schwartzman in the opening round yesterday.

Kyrgios, whom cut ties with his coach Todd Larkham last week, proved too powerful for Schwartzman as he ousted him 6-0, 6-2, 7-6 (8-6) within 85 minutes.

However, there was a controversy during the match when Kyrgios yelled “dirty scum” after a dispute with the experienced chair umpire Mohamed Lahyani in the third set.

After the match, the 20 year-old was bombarded with questions and he explained himself.

“Yeah, I mean, obviously I knew you guys were going to ask me about that,” he said.

“I wasn’t referring to the ref (Lahyani) at all there,” he added.

“Yeah, I mean, it was towards myself.” When asked why would he call himself that, he said “Cause, I can.”

Despite facing the possibility of being fined, the Canberra-born player was nonchalant about it.

“Wouldn’t bother me one bit,” he exclaimed.

On the talks of his performance yesterday, Kyrgios was impressed by his own delivery.

“I came out really strong,” he said.

“I haven’t been playing too much tennis, I’ve been sick (sinus infection).”

“I started unbelievable. I barely missed a ballin the first two and a half sets.”

“I knew that he was going to come back at some stage and he played really well in the third set.”

“I’m going gain so much confidence out of that third set, I had to dig deep.”

The Australian young gun made an upset last year by defeating Spaniard Rafael Nadal and Richard Gasquet en route to reaching the Wimbledon quarter finals.

Kyrgios will be playing against either German Florian Mayer or Argentinean Juan Monaco in the next round.

Photo credits: CNN

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