Completely out of character...
Nick Kyrgios is an enigma. Incredibly talented, hugely entertaining and unbeatable on his day, he could, arguably should be one of the world's best. But his temperament often gets the better of him and has undoubtedly been an obstacle for the Australian. Basically, he's tennis' Mario Balotelli.
He disciplinary record, shall we say, leaves a lot to be desired. He is known to lash out verbally at his opponents and smash his racquets in moments of rage, but on Thursday he turned to a spectator and unleashed a barrage of verbal abuse.
During his Rome Masters 1000 second round match against Casper Rudd, Kyrgios turned a the spectator, who appeared to have made a distracting noise, before calling him a "f***ing retard."
He then proceeded to smash his racquet on the ground, exclaiming "I'm f***ing done", and throw a chair across the court.
https://twitter.com/andreopines/status/1129014769237860352?s=21
For his actions, Kyrgios was defaulted - the first player to be defaulted since Denis Shapovalov in 2017 - and Rudd went through to round three.
Tennis fans won't be surprised to see this sort of behaviour from the Australian, who has never been that fussed about being liked. In fact, he launched an attack on Novak Djoković recently while speaking to the No Challenges Remaining podcast, criticising his apparent need to be liked.
"He has a sick obsession with being liked. He wants to be liked so much that I can't stand it. It's so cringe-worthy," Kyrgios said of the Serb.
