Nick Kyrgios has claimed he will retire from tennis if he wins the 2023 Australian Open, which gets started next month.
World No.22 Kyrgios has just enjoyed his most successful year on the ATP Tour, finishing as runner-up at Wimbledon in his best appearance at a Grand Slam.
The 27-year-old, notorious for his behaviour on and off court, also produced his best performance at the US Open with a run to the quarter-finals – while in the men’s doubles – he won the Australian Open alongside Thanasi Kokkinakis.
It was not just at the majors where Australian Kyrgios impressed in 2022 though, as he also lifted the Washington Open title in August.
But all attentions now turn towards the new season, with the first Grand Slam of the year – the 2023 Australian Open – getting started on January 16.
‘Hopefully I can win a Slam and just retire,’ Kyrgios said via Wide World of Sports.
‘I had a lot of fun [in 2022]. I’m finally just proud to say I made a Slam final and started to meet some expectations.
‘I had a lot of fun, I enjoyed it, definitely felt better off and on the court.’
Meanwhile, Jamie Murray is predicting big things for British players ahead of the 2023 season.
2021 US Open champion Emma Raducanu had a year to forget in 2022, failing to win a single event on the WTA Tour and struggling at the majors.
But there was better news for Britain’s male players, with Andy Murray continuing his resurgence from hip problems while Cameron Norrie broke into the world top 10 and reached a Wimbledon semi-final in his best-ever major performance.
At the US Open, four British men reached the third round for the first time ever.
‘I think it could be lots of different reasons,’ Murray told the Express. ‘I think it obviously helps to have players from your country at the top of the sport, which obviously Andy has forever, Jo [Konta] was doing that for a few years.
‘I think it gives those players something to aspire to and feeling like, you know, ‘maybe I can go do that’ because they can see one of their own countrymen and women doing that, I think that’s really important to have that.
‘I think once you start to get a group around a similar level, they obviously start to push each other more, and I think the fact that in a way the pandemic kind of brought everyone under one roof at Roehampton.
‘All of a sudden I guess, like Andy’s doing a lot of training with some of the younger boys, like Jack [Draper] he spent a lot of time with, doing a lot of training with Norrie and [Dan] Evans.
‘There’s a good group of guys there that all get on well, they’re into their tennis, they train hard and I think that just helps the level get higher.
‘I know I can imagine it’s the same with the girls as well, they’ve got a good group now from sort of 150 to 80 [in the rankings], there’s a bunch of them, and I’m sure they will all be competitive and want to do better than the others.
‘That will push them to have good results, and who knows, maybe next year at some point it could be five or six of them all inside of [the top] 100, which is amazing.’
MORE : ‘Silly little brat!’ – Simon Jordan rips into tennis rebel Nick Kyrgios over award snub
MORE : Emma Raducanu ignores Andy Murray’s advice with yet another short-term coach appointment
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