Bernard Tomic on track for another comeback

By Linda Pearce
Updated May 25 2014 - 10:14am, first published April 25 2014 - 2:50am

Bernard Tomic's first comeback from double hip surgery lasted for the 26 minutes it took the Queenslander to suffer the quickest recorded loss in ATP history. His next has been pencilled in for the qualifying rounds of the Madrid Open at the end of next week.

Tomic, who won just 13 points against Jarkko Nieminen in that ill-advised return in Miami on March 21, has borne a full load on the practice court for the past three weeks, having recovered well from the January procedures on both hips that followed his first-round injury retirement at the Australian Open against Rafael Nadal.

His ranking now having slipped to 71st, and No.4 in Australia behind Lleyton Hewitt, Matt Ebden and Marinko Matosevic, the 21-year-old apparently hopes to be fit and healthy to contest qualifying in Madrid – the scene of his father John's infamous headbutting incident involving hitting partner Thomas Drouet outside the player hotel almost a year ago.

Tomic snr's 12-month tournament ban is being reviewed before it expires on May 4, with no indication yet about whether it will be extended. The ATP-imposed suspension has been enforced at all but the two tournaments – Queen's Club and Sydney – where Tomic attended his son's matches as a paying spectator.

Tennis Australia president Stephen Healy said Tomic's status was a matter for the ATP World Tour, and said TA had not "taken a view" on the issue. But Healy did urge Tomic jnr to start making the most of his undoubted potential, three years after he famously reached the Wimbledon quarter-finals from qualifying.

"I think it's really important Bernard gets his act together," Healy said. "He's a huge talent, and he's got to make a decision how he's going to maximise his talent. Only he knows how that's going to work – whether that's with his father, or with another coach who has control, that's the decision he’s got to make, and time will pass him by if he doesn't make a good decision."

"From our point of view, if we've got Bernard, and we've got Nick Kyrgios and we've got Thanasi Kokkinakis, we're a force to be reckoned with in a couple of years. It will be fantastic, so I really hope he does make some good decisions."

Krygios and Kokkinakis met for the first time at senior level at the Savannah Challenger in the US on Wednesday. Kyrgios, 19, who resumed from an elbow injury to claim last week's Sarasota Open, beat his close friend and Davis Cup teammate 6-1, 6-3 on the green clay to enhance his French Open wildcard prospects ahead of the May 25 grand slam.

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