Rosstour
G.O.A.T.
Not just in matches--on the practice court too. He hasn't added anything to his game, as you say. If he stays one-dimensional like that, his best case is vulturing a Wimbledon or two.
Kyrgios: "Grass is pure tennis, clay is not"
- Thread starter jm1980
- Start date
Not just in matches--on the practice court too. He hasn't added anything to his game, as you say. If he stays one-dimensional like that, his best case is vulturing a Wimbledon or two.
I doubt Nick has the consistency or endurance to win Wimbledon or any other slam.
Rosstour
G.O.A.T.
I thought the same about Ivanesevic. Was a nice moment when he proved me wrong.
Kyrgios is a head case too, he probably won't fully mature until 30+.
mike danny
Bionic Poster
The Nishikori match convinced me Nick was useless on any surface.
I don't get the hype around him. His talent also isn't magnificent.
ForumMember
Hall of Fame
Looks like Nick slept through whole 6 hours "Grass court Tennis" between Anderson and Isner where whole world was desperate waiting for their grass court tennis to get over and "Clay Court Tennis" to start between Djoko and Nadal.
MatsPhilander
Legend
it patently is & he has the rare ability of great showmanship. The problem is purely attitude/application-which he has improved on a bit recently. If he had his head on straight he would be winning slams right now & would be the dominant player of the next decade.
Steve0904
Talk Tennis Guru
Kyrgios is right about grass, but there are plenty of tennis skills required for clay, many of them being the same as grass. The serve and FH might not win you as many points on clay by itself, but point construction is the bigger issue on clay. Clay rewards defense more and grass rewards offense.
Kyrgios doesn't have the defensive capabilities required for clay so he hates it. Understandable I suppose, but a bit childish too.
Kyrgios doesn't have the defensive capabilities required for clay so he hates it. Understandable I suppose, but a bit childish too.
mike danny
Bionic Poster
Nah, his game is one dimensional too. And his return sucks. You don't break, you don't win, much less dominate.
Just look at the AO this year. No attitude problem and he still lost to Dimitrov by losing every tiebreak despite his big serve.
PrinceMoron
Legend
Went to get a beer and the first set was over 6-1
Kyrgios was just pathetic.
Should have wandered around the outside courts instead
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Im(moral) Winner
G.O.A.T.
Noah?
heninfan99
Talk Tennis Guru
Nah. Wawrinka beat Djoker with skill as well has heart.
D
Deleted member 23235
Guest
+1
clay is a counter punchers wet dream.
hc, or anything fast is where ball bashers thrive... 1 shot and done.
MatsPhilander
Legend
He is half-assing most of the time, playing very lazy shots & loses interest. He isn't the finished article by any means-but like Ostapenko the raw talent is amazing & once she gets some seasoning & learns some tricks she will be very hard to stop. Sad he doesn't have her desire to be the best & never give up, we have seen how it has paid off for her with so much room for improvement but already a slam winner & making it to the business end of most tournaments now.
Purplemonster
Hall of Fame
Is Nick a TTW curmudgeon?
"People say tennis now doesn’t belong on the grass but that’s not true", said Kyrgios. "It is pure tennis at its finest. You have to be talented to play on grass. If you have a good serve and a good return, you get rewarded. If you come forward you benefit but if you do that on any other surface, you get punished".
"Clay-court tennis for me is not tennis at all. There is no creativity. It’s all about fitness and lasting out there. There’s none of the skill that is needed for grass", added Kyrgios.
https://www.essentiallysports.com/grass-pure-tennis-clay-nick-kyrgios/amp/
Two different surfaces that require two different types of skills sets but there is common ground between the two surfaces as well e.g. Borg but then again that’s just raw talent.
Kyrgios can’t win a tournament on either of those surfaces so it’s probably best he keeps his big mouth shut and TRIES to win something. This guy will never mature.
fundrazer
G.O.A.T.
Do we really need to relist all of the ballbasher players who have had their best success on clay yet again?
Hey Simon is a counter puncher but he kinda sucks on clay. Hewitt as well. Oh hey their best results are on faster surfaces. Murray had almost no success on clay up until the past few years also.
Zverev, soderling, almagro, gulbis all have best results on clay. How do they play tennis? They hit the ball pretty hard I think, not a lot of variety.
Harder for counter punchers to redirect pace on clay compared to hard, while the bigger hitters can actually hit through people on slower surfaces.
King No1e
G.O.A.T.
Chang made a bunch of finals later. Gomez had already had a great career before his last title. Muster was a clay specialist but he won a bunch of high level tournaments and became #1.
If all tennis were played on clay, TV ratings would be lower and interest in the sport would be lower. If all tennis were played on grass or fast hard courts, TV ratings would be as good or better as now and interest would be better.
Clay is part of history and it may be the best surface to play on as a rec player as it is easy on the body, but pro tennis on clay can get boring.
Clay is part of history and it may be the best surface to play on as a rec player as it is easy on the body, but pro tennis on clay can get boring.
Atennisone
Hall of Fame
Oh yeah, (WB SF) Isner vs Anderson was much less boring than (RG SF) Thiem vs Cecchinato was this year, right?
Tennis_Hands
Banned
Yeah, "pretty easy".
That's why John Servebot Isner has a grand total of 1 Wimbledon SF, has rarely been past the third round at Wimbledon, and has on average a poorer record there than at the FO.
HipRotation
Hall of Fame
Adriano Panatta played a very stylish net game.
Both surfaces are real tennis. However, I agree with Nick for the most part. Any great athlete can pick up a tennis racquet, learn to hit a forehand, and be a solid play court player. If you only have a great forehand, you can be good on clay. If you only have a great serve, you can be good on grass. But the forehand is a much simpler stroke, and nearly everybody develops a solid forehand before a solid serve. The forehand is a very natural motion for somebody who is athletic. They won't have the beauty of a Federer forehand, but they can muscle through it like a Nadal forehand. Nadal doesn't have great forehand technique, but it works fantastically. The serve is much harder to do well without proper technique. Many athletes try out tennis, and they get the forehand comfortable in one session, but it might take weeks for them to develop a decent serve.
If you don't have that one dominant shot (serve for grass, forehand for clay), you can get by on clay purely with your generic athleticism (assuming basic tennis skills are there); running back and forth, just hitting decent shots back. But on grass, that doesn't work because the court is faster. You need more tennis-specific skills, but you don't need as much generic athleticism. You can get by with basic athleticism, but great tennis skills; variety in forehands and backhands, slices, short and deep, approach shots, half volleys, volleys, etc.
I'm not saying one surface is better than the other, they're just different. Clay promotes generic athleticism over tennis-specific skills. Grass promotes tennis-specific skills over generic athleticism. Obviously both skill types are required for both surfaces, they just each lean towards a different type a little more. Personally, I love when I'm coaching on clay, or just playing for fun, but if I'm competing, I'd much rather be on a hard court because it suits my game more. I've never played on grass personally, although it is on my bucket list. I prefer watching grass because of the variety of points and play styles, and I love watching great servers as well, whereas I don't enjoy watching somebody stand back at the baseline just getting balls back all day as much; although I do enjoy watching the likes of Wawrinka, especially when he won the French Open, but he crushes the ball rather than relying on running around to get to every ball and putting it back in play.
If you don't have that one dominant shot (serve for grass, forehand for clay), you can get by on clay purely with your generic athleticism (assuming basic tennis skills are there); running back and forth, just hitting decent shots back. But on grass, that doesn't work because the court is faster. You need more tennis-specific skills, but you don't need as much generic athleticism. You can get by with basic athleticism, but great tennis skills; variety in forehands and backhands, slices, short and deep, approach shots, half volleys, volleys, etc.
I'm not saying one surface is better than the other, they're just different. Clay promotes generic athleticism over tennis-specific skills. Grass promotes tennis-specific skills over generic athleticism. Obviously both skill types are required for both surfaces, they just each lean towards a different type a little more. Personally, I love when I'm coaching on clay, or just playing for fun, but if I'm competing, I'd much rather be on a hard court because it suits my game more. I've never played on grass personally, although it is on my bucket list. I prefer watching grass because of the variety of points and play styles, and I love watching great servers as well, whereas I don't enjoy watching somebody stand back at the baseline just getting balls back all day as much; although I do enjoy watching the likes of Wawrinka, especially when he won the French Open, but he crushes the ball rather than relying on running around to get to every ball and putting it back in play.
Djokovic2011
Bionic Poster
Even though clay is my least favourite surface I disagree with Kyrgios that no skill or creativity is required for playing on it and strongly suspect his comments stem from the fact he's pretty useless on the dirt and realises he'll never achieve anything noteworthy between the months of April-June.
Sudacafan
Bionic Poster
Well, to be honest, I think grass is not tennis, just because I never set foot on a grass tennis court nor imagine how tennis can be played on that surface.
I wonder if Wimbledon isn’t a great conspiracy theory to sell a TV show, all fake. A place where by the second week, there’s no grass on the baselines, so players are competing on dirt, or on soil, whatever. It’s a vanishing depleting-on-usage kind of surface. It’s like you started playing a tournament on clay, and then you run out or clay... imagine that with a hard court, the surface being eroded as the competition advances, and you get to the final not knowing on what you are playing.
Last but not least, I find quite impossible that a tennis ball bounces on grass. At least on the South American grass I am used to see.
Sudacafan
Bionic Poster
And what did this guy do after this? It’s been some years ago, hasn’t it?
Sudacafan
Bionic Poster
So he’s like Kournikova without the looks.
jm1980
Talk Tennis Guru
Obviously you can't have grass as tall as you'd have in a football pitch
But I can assure you, the ball does bounce. It just bounces lower
junior74
Talk Tennis Guru
He's been hiding his talent from us, in protest against the long clay season?
It wasn't too serious a post, but I do think his teenage win against Nadal in Wimbledon is significant in its own right. It made him relevant. He has also beaten the rest of the Big5, which is not too shabby. I would be surprised if Kyrgios doesn't win a Wimbledon title.
Nadalgaenger
G.O.A.T.
Would be awesome if Kyrgios wins the FO and that is his only major!
Nadalgaenger
G.O.A.T.
So I guess Nadal/Djokovic 2013 FO SF could never hold a candle to the golden tennis of Isner/Mahut!
Doctor/Lawyer Red Devil
Talk Tennis Guru
Yeah you need talent to play on grass.
Shame all Nick has instead is yawn servebotting. :/
Shame all Nick has instead is yawn servebotting. :/
D
Deleted member 756486
Guest
Kyrgios is the Manchester United of tennis.
Just kidding...that’s MILOS.
I Am Finnish
Bionic Poster
Grass is for cows sorry to tell you that mate
- Ivan Lendl
- Ivan Lendl
Tennis_Hands
Banned
captainbryce
Hall of Fame
Roger Federer is pure tennis at its finest. Nick Kyrgios is not tennis at all!Is Nick a TTW curmudgeon?
"People say tennis now doesn’t belong on the grass but that’s not true", said Kyrgios. "It is pure tennis at its finest. You have to be talented to play on grass. If you have a good serve and a good return, you get rewarded. If you come forward you benefit but if you do that on any other surface, you get punished".
"Clay-court tennis for me is not tennis at all. There is no creativity. It’s all about fitness and lasting out there. There’s none of the skill that is needed for grass", added Kyrgios.
https://www.essentiallysports.com/grass-pure-tennis-clay-nick-kyrgios/amp/
Zetty
Hall of Fame
Overreact much?
Freddy Cat
Professional
Grass court tennis is literally like watching a movie with all the boring stuff taken out.
MichaelNadal
Bionic Poster
Hes basically saying clay is too much work for him, I agree. Its certainly not a lazy man's surface.
NoleFam
Bionic Poster
TheFifthSet
Legend
Nick’s a petulant little boy that can’t win on any surface, so who cares what he thinks is real tennis?
This has become Kyrgios’ M.O, slyly looking for any reason to explain away his lack of success or finding outs by blatantly tanking matches (“hey, I didn’t lose, I wasn’t trying and have better places to be heuheuheu”)
He’s an unhappy man-child and I vacillate between feeling sympathy for him and actively wishing that he loses every match he plays for the rest of his career.
This has become Kyrgios’ M.O, slyly looking for any reason to explain away his lack of success or finding outs by blatantly tanking matches (“hey, I didn’t lose, I wasn’t trying and have better places to be heuheuheu”)
He’s an unhappy man-child and I vacillate between feeling sympathy for him and actively wishing that he loses every match he plays for the rest of his career.
Last edited:
TheFifthSet
Legend
And for the record, his game even at its best is wildly overrated. Tsonga in his early 20’s was every bit the player this mythical “Peak Kyrgios” is, and was even more consistent, yet received maybe a quarter of the hype.
Sentinel
Bionic Poster
Is Nick a TTW curmudgeon?
"People say tennis now doesn’t belong on the grass but that’s not true", said Kyrgios. "It is pure tennis at its finest. You have to be talented to play on grass. If you have a good serve and a good return, you get rewarded. If you come forward you benefit but if you do that on any other surface, you get punished".
"Clay-court tennis for me is not tennis at all. There is no creativity. It’s all about fitness and lasting out there. There’s none of the skill that is needed for grass", added Kyrgios.
https://www.essentiallysports.com/grass-pure-tennis-clay-nick-kyrgios/amp/
We BULLfans demand that Kyrgios be banned from picking up a tennis racket.
#TeamBULL
@beltsman
ChaelAZ
G.O.A.T.
MichaelNadal
Bionic Poster
Of course Maestronians would literally be fine with changing tennis history, if not the very definition of the sport of tennis to one-up Nadal, even in the face of common sense.
Similar threads
