Wimbledon: Kyrgios disappointed with ban on players | Tennis News – Times of India

LONDON: Nick Kyrgios‘ talk is as big as his serve. While comments like, ‘I’ve made top-10 players look pretty ordinary this year’ make a lot of noise, the 27-year-old’s sagacity kicks the chalk. The world No. 40 ruled that Wimbledon‘s ban of Russian and Belarusian players threw shade on the sport.
“(Daniil) Medvedev is the best we have in our sport right now. (Andrey) Rublev and (Karen) Khachanov are important young players for our sport to continue to grow,” he said.
“Whenever we have cameras on and a lot of people tuning in, you want our best players to be on show so that the sport can grow.”
“As a competitor and someone who wants to go up against them, I’m disappointed they’re not here,” Kyrgios said of the world No. 1 Medvedev and No. 8 Rublev. “It’s weird not seeing Medvedev here. We all know what he’s capable of. They wanted to play. They just want to be a part of it. I’m disappointed they’re not here,” he added.
The ATP and WTA Tours’ decision to strip the championships of ranking points didn’t quite strike where it should’ve, Kyrgios argued.
“As a kid, when I watched Wimbledon, I wasn’t thinking about ranking points. I was thinking about playing in the most prestigious tournament in the world.
That’s all I’m here for,” he said. “There’s people that are: ‘I’m not going to play Wimbledon because of ranking points. I’m going to go play a challenger that week.’ When I’m sitting with my kids in the future, I’m not going to be proud to say I played a Challenger instead of Wimbledon.”