Nick Kyrgios seems intent on waging a personal crusade against the recent doping cases that have rocked the tennis world. In particular, those of world number one Jannik Sinner and former WTA number one Iga Swiatek. The Australian tennis player, who will return to action next week in Brisbane after more than a year out – he has not competed since June 2023 when he played in Stuttgart – took advantage of his press conference to unleash his verbal artillery.
“It’s to disgust you. I can lose my temper, throw the racket, but that has nothing to do with cheating and taking performance-enhancing products,” said the Aussie when asked about the Italian and Polish players’ positives.
A journalist then asked him if he was calling the world number one a cheat, to which Kyrgios replied: “He tested positive twice at different times. If he didn’t do anything wrong, why did they take away his bonuses and ATP points? Clearly they felt something bad had happened.”
Integrity in tennis is in question at the moment. Everybody knows it but nobody wants to talk about it, it’s horrible
A few months after Sinner was acquitted after his doping case was considered ‘accidental’, Swiatek was suspended for a month after the discovery in August of trimetazidine in her body. Also in this case theInternational Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) accepted the excuse of contamination.
“That two world number ones (Swiatek is currently number two but was number one at the time of the test) are discovered for doping is disgusting for our sport. It gives a horrible image,” Kyrgios said before adding: “The integrity in tennis at the moment is in question. Everyone knows it but no one wants to talk about it, it’s horrible.”
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