(Reuters) – Wimbledon runner-up Nick Kyrgios does not require a coach but someone like Sigmund Freud to sort out his problems as tennis needs the Australian maverick, seven-times major winner John McEnroe said.
The 27-year-old Kyrgios was beaten by Novak Djokovic in the Wimbledon final on Sunday but not before he had left his mark on the grasscourt major where he delighted fans with his immense talent but also frustrated them with his temperament.
“I get a lot of what’s going on here more than most people,” the 63-year-old McEnroe, who was no stranger to petulance on the court during his playing days, told the BBC.
“He’s a good kid, the players like him, he’s well liked in the locker room, he does a lot of charity work. But he’s got demons — we all have this fear of failure and it’s a question of how you best deal with it.”
Three-times Wimbledon winner McEnroe, nicknamed “Superbrat” before becoming a respected analyst, said that he was amazed by Kyrgios’ talent but added that he needed help from someone like psychoanalysis founder Freud to help.
“It’s unbelievable so he moves the needle for us in tennis. We need this big time, but we don’t need him to try half the time,” McEnroe said.
“Who should coach Nick Kyrgios? John McEnroe of course but he’s untouchable. The guy doesn’t need the coach, the guy is a genius the way he plays.
“He needs Sigmund Freud to come out of the grave and somehow figure out a way to keep this guy going for a couple of years, because we could use him.
“… He’s obviously tortured in certain ways. Unbelievably talented, smart. Hell of a player when he wants to be and so you want to nurture that in a way as an ex-player, as a father, as a fan, as a commentator, so I can relate a lot.”
(Reporting by Shrivathsa Sridhar in Bengaluru; Editing by Ken Ferris)
