John McEnroe has told Nick Kyrgios that he doesn’t need to direct his anger towards his loved ones in his own box of players during matches. Kyrgios suffered a collapse during his Wimbledon final against Novak Djokovic on Sunday as he kept screaming at his box as the match began to run away from him.
“He’s a good kid to be with,” McEnroe told Carol Vorderman in Lorraine on Monday. “He has demons, I guess we all have them. It’s like dealing with them. He yells at his box: these are the people who support him more than anyone and he chases them, literally yelling at everyone in change.
“Nick somehow feels like a younger kid and you try to take advantage of that amazing talent and that person and shape him into what we all hope he is. On the track, he can’t help himself.
“I hope he looks at the tape; it’s hard to see him when you’re losing. But if he looks at what he did in his own box: his father, his girlfriend, whoever he was, he was yelling [them] to get some steam out. I hope you say, ‘I don’t need to do this.’ “
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But McEnroe hopes Kyrgios’ experience over the past two weeks will help him compete for honors in future tournaments. “People always ask me about Kyrgios, who is an incredible talent,” added the three-time Wimbledon champion. “Good boy and the players like him, but the problem he has had is the fear of failure. How do you deal with the expectations and pressure you put on yourself, what others put on you?
“I hope this is a harbinger of things to come because, like when I came on stage, they called me punk. He sees himself in a lot of ways as normal, but then he goes up to a tennis court and says, ‘ I don’t like tennis, I hate it. “I hope he engages in it for a couple of years because people saw what he was capable of. Maybe one day he will listen to me or someone and we can all live happily ever after. always”.