Nick Kyrgios is going to be touch and go right up until the 2025 Australian Open begins, with the Australian admitting he “may need a miracle” to play in his home Grand Slam with the wrist injuries he’s nursing.
The Aussie entertainer is on the long-awaited comeback trail after a lengthy injury layoff and played at the Brisbane International this week. He lost to French starlet Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard in three — and then immediately admitted he may not make the big dance as “reality” about his wrist reconstruction slowly begins to seep in.
It was clear during the match that Kyrgios was managing the tender wrist, taking longer than average breaks at times to get checked by his physio and even more than once asking for painkillers from the court-side doctors.
“I think I was really excited for the Aus Open, but after today, if I’m able to play, I’m able to play,” he admitted.
“I think I almost need a miracle, and I need, like, the stars to align for my wrist to hold up in a Grand Slam for sure. Today, if this was a Grand Slam, we may still be out on court, and I don’t know how I’d pull up the next day or the day after.
“Yeah, that’s kind of the reality setting in.”
Kyrgios is currently still inked in to contest the Australian Open main draw when it begins on January 12, but training will give him a clearer picture regarding what he can really manage day-to-day, he explained.
One hurdle is done, he added, with the match play in the Brisbane Open singles as well as his doubles team-up with Novak Djokovic in the same tournament, but he is completely aware that “not one tennis player has ever had this surgery and come back and tried to play again.”
“It’s all really experimental — I don’t really have any protocol of how it’s going to be or how it’s going to pull up,” he continued.
“So me and my physio, we are taking it as it comes. If we can get through a match, we get through a match.
“For me, honestly, it was a great match, considering I hadn’t played in 18 months,” he then added about his three-set battle with Mpetshi Perricard that even went to tiebreaker twice. “To put myself in a winning position was exciting.” The 29-year-old said he “felt relatively pretty good physically — my legs, my body felt really good.”
“How it pulls up tomorrow, I have no idea,” he concluded. “It’s throbbing like shit right now.”
