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20-YEAR-OLD Australian player Nick Kyrgios became the talk of the tennis world on Monday for his antics during a fourth-round loss to Richard Gasquet at Wimbledon.
In addition to getting in an argument with the chair umpire because he wanted to change his socks, Kyrgios stopped trying and tanked an entire game after receiving a warning for cursing early in the second set.
He simply let Gasquet’s serves go by for aces, or tapped his returns into the net like this:
The fans booed, the commentators scolded him, and after the match he had a contemptuous news conference with media members who wanted him to answer for his bit of tanking.
But not all of the tennis world is bent out of shape about this. Many people feel that strategic tanking can be a useful tactic at times.
One of the most eloquent defences of Kyrgios came from Roger Federer, who was surprisingly candid about the controversy in a post-match news conference. Federer compared what Kyrgios did to a boxer dropping his hands for a few seconds to regain his composure, and he said it was understandable for a young player to get frustrated and take off a game to regroup.
When asked whether Kyrgios disrespected the paying fans by throwing a game, Federer said a game “is like 55 seconds.”
“So one game to me is part of tactics, as well, sometimes to throw the other guy off,” he said. “Maybe yourself, you can be frustrated and just not feel like it for a couple of points.”
His full response is great (via Christopher Clarey):
REPORTER: There was a moment on Court 2 today when Kyrgios appeared to tank a game, not try.
FEDERER: One game?
REPORTER: One game, yeah. Can you understand someone getting frustrated and doing that or do you find that disrespectful?
FEDERER: Towards whom?
REPORTER: Toward the crowd who paid good money to watch you.
FEDERER: A game is like 55 seconds. Again, did he really do it or not? A game where a guy serves well, is that tanking, too? It’s like sometimes it’s like a boxer when he puts his hands down, is that tanking? Then he swings freely again. I think we shouldn’t dig too deep into those kinds of things. If you told me he did an entire set, plus more, plus this, I’d say, ‘Okay, it’s a bit much probably.’
But I just watched the end of the third and the end of the fourth. He was fighting then. He was really wanting to win and he should have been in the fifth at the end. So in my opinion, it was a great match and it was close. The fans got their money’s worth, in my opinion. It was a close match last year. He saved nine match points against Richard. Today two.
So one game to me is part of tactics, as well, sometimes to throw the other guy off. Maybe yourself, you can be frustrated and just not feel like it for a couple of points. Especially a younger guy, it’s going to happen more often than one of the top guys that have been around, that just like say, ‘Okay, point mentality, we’ll do it again and again and again and again. For younger guys, it’s a little bit boring at times, which I understand.
While it was pretty absurd to watch Kyrgios just stand there and let Gasquet’s serves fly by him, he did recover after that point, winning the third set and pushing Gasquet in the fourth before ultimately losing.
In his own news conference, Kyrgios said he didn’t stop trying and challenged a media member to get a racquet and return Gasquet’s serves himself if it’s so easy.
Mayweather is a coward
Any man who hits a woman like he did is..
While they will both go down as 2 of the best pound for pounders, I think they’ll both also go down as the top two guys who devalued the sport of boxing as much as anybody else. I love boxing but if you look at the politics and corruption without boxing, it’s such an ugly sport.
If both men really wanted to prove their the best then they would have made this fight happen… Mayweather is the best of all time but not fighting Pac shows he wasn’t the bravest or most courageous fighter of all time and has selected a hard, talented but ultimately lower class fighter such as Maidana for his next fight… that’s where the true art of boxing has been lost over the last decade.
Once upon a time Pacquaio might have beaten Mayweather but that time had passed in afraid. Love him or hate him Mayweather is one of the best we’ve ever seen.
He continues to damage his credibility as a boxer and his fighting legacy with stupid throwaway comments like this.
If the challenging fighter isn’t a come forward brawler who walks into punches every round Mayweather has no interest in fighting them.
He will eventually give Pacquiao a shot so he can collect a massive payday, but only when Pacmans legs are completely gone, the same way he made Shane Moseley wait the best part of a decade until he was way, way past his prime and had the cheek to promote the farce as a “superfight”….
I’d love to see someone beat the shite out of Mayweather! …. Don’t think Pacquaio would be able too though..
Mayweather will never be beating. The greatest boxer of all time
Statistically
*beaten
I think what he is saying is pacman was using drugs when he had all the power. A little dig there
Good read, show the level of Mayweathers opponents to date:
http://www.badlefthook.com/2013/9/19/4747960/floyd-mayweather-and-the-10-greatest-unbeaten-fighters-of-all-time