Tennis stars Kyrgios and Tomic feud after fake illness claims
One of Australia's youngest tennis stars is taking a leaf out of Kanye West's book.
Nick Kyrgios threw out hostilities on Twitter following a comment by Bernard Tomic, filmed on the sidelines during a Davis Cup match in Victoria on Sunday, in which he claimed Kyrgios had faked a sickness.
Kyrgios withdrew from the Davis Cup matches against the U.S., citing illness and back injury, after reportedly struggling through a fitness test on Thursday morning. Not that Tomic was convinced.
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On the sidelines during his 3-1 loss to American John Isner, Tomic said: "Two times Nick's faked it. Twice ... Nick's sitting down in Canberra. Bullshit he's sick." The comments were picked up by television cameras.
Tomic backtracked on his remarks at a press conference after the match, but said he would lose respect for Kyrgios if he recovered from his illness to play an ATP tournament in Indian Wells, California this week, pointing to a similar situation in Czech Republic last year.
"Obviously, I would have loved him to be here, but he is obviously sick like he says he is. For me, I think now it will be seeing if he actually plays Indian Wells," Tomic said.
"So now it's going to be really funny for me to see the next two days whether he plays or not, which I think he will ... If he plays Indian Wells, then he's definitely lost a little bit of my respect."
Unsurprisingly, Kyrgios didn't take claims he was embellishing his illness very well, making his feelings known on Twitter on Sunday.
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Kyrgios also took a stab at Tomic's record the ATP tour, before deleting the tweet.
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Tomic said in the press conference the pair were on "good terms" following a telephone call after the match, according to Fairfax. He reiterated he was disappointed with Kyrgios's no show, saying he had his own wrist problems that plagued him throughout the match.
Australia's Davis Cup captain, Lleyton Hewitt, who came out of retirement to replace the ill Kyrgios, said he was certain his younger compatriot wasn't lying about his sickness at the same press conference.
"We ruled Nick out," Hewitt said. "He came down here, he gave everything he had to try and put his hand up to be available, there's no doubt he was sick, absolutely no doubt."
Time will tell who of these two strong-headed players will win this off-court battle.
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