By Chris Oddo | Sunday July 3, 2016
In Andy Murray, Nick Kyrgios has discovered an unlikely ally in the game of winning hearts and minds. It’s a game that Kyrgios didn’t appear willing to participate in until recently but the 21-year-old Aussie is showing signs of evolution these days. Long misunderstood and much maligned, Kyrgios has been under the media’s unforgiving microscope for two years—it’s been a rough ride to say the least.
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Enter Murray, Kyrgios’ opponent in one of the marquee matches of Wimbledon’s Manic Monday, and there appears a light at the end of the tunnel that could portend an end to Kyrgios’ dark days as both ATP bad boy and scapegoat.
“He backs me up a lot, which is good,” Kyrgios said of Murray on Sunday after he’d picked apart Feliciano Lopez to reach the second week at Wimbledon for the third straight year. “It's just good to have one of the best players in the world, to have a good friend like that obviously.”
Kyrgios is referring to Murray’s public endorsement of him, which came late on Saturday as he broke down his third-round win with members of the press. “You guys try and wind him up the whole time,” Murray said to reporters. “It's not really fair on him, to be honest.”
Murray also echoed sentiments expressed regularly by Kyrgios of late: That he’s been getting unfair treatment based on his reputation. “It happens a lot where it doesn't seem like he's really done much in comparison to what other players are doing, and he's the one that gets asked all the questions about it,” he said.
There are those that have chosen not to like Kyrgios and they’ll spend the next ten years of his career actively doing that. First impressions tend to have that effect, but there is a feeling that Kyrgios is moving in a different direction these days. Kinder and gentler? Well, that’s a stretch. But an allegiance with Murray can only help.
Friendship or not, on Monday he’ll have to try to beat the No.2 seed and new consensus Wimbledon favorite after Novak Djokovic tumbled from the draw like a meteor from the sky on Saturday. The Serb’s disappearance has more than just Murray feeling like they may have been dealt a winning hand at Wimbledon this year.
“I think as soon as Novak loses, you look at Andy and you look at Federer's eyes light up,” Kyrgios said. “They think that their chances probably doubled. I think a lot of people in the locker room now believe they can win it. If the stars align and they're playing well, there's a lot of people that can go get it.”
Going for it shouldn’t be a problem for the energetic Kyrgios. Getting it is a much tougher proposition.
Kyrgios is winless in four matches against Murray, three of which have come at majors, but the 21-year-old says he takes confidence away from winning his first set against Murray at last year’s U.S. Open and from defeating him at the Hopman Cup exhibition this January.
But can he produce something similar in scope to what Sam Querrey pulled on Saturday against Novak Djokovic?
“I definitely feel like he's beatable,” Kyrgios said. “He's only human. At the same time he's a great player.”
Grass is Kyrgios’ favorite surface and watching him on it, one can quickly understand his affinity for it. His serve finds the corners and constantly frustrates his opponents. He’s got the variance of strokes that thrive on the grass. He can move the ball, drag opponents side-to-side, befuddle them with changes of pace, and knock them down with stinging injections of power.
But Murray’s got all of that in his bag of tricks and then some in the form of a huge home-court advantage.
Kyrgios admitted that Murray playing all three of his matches on Centre while he has been relegated to different courts will make an upset trickier to accomplish on Monday. Players don’t get to practice on Centre Court at Wimbledon like they would at other venues—instead they are sent to the fields of Aorangi Park at the north of the grounds to hit while the Centre Court grass is fussed over by Wimbledon’s finicky groundstaff.
“He’s obviously comfortable there. It's like his backyard,” Kyrgios said.
He added: “I played there once before. I feel comfortable going out there as well. It's the same dimensions as any court I've played on since I was a little kid.”