After Bernard Tomic's recent straight sets defeat to Mischa Zverev in the first round of Wimbledon, The 24-year-old followed up the loss with one of the most extraordinary and frank press conferences that the sport has ever seen.
Tomic told the press in no uncertain terms that he felt "bored" and "unmotivated" during the match, and went on to suggest that he probably doesn't respect the sport because he knows that after his career is over, he won't have to work again.
Quite unsurprisingly, reactions were largely negative, and the Australian has since been fined $20,000 for the comments as well as admitting that he feigned injury in the match to halt his opponent's progress. Some commentators called for him to quit the sport, but former professional Australian rules footballer Adam Cooney sympathised with Tomic, suggesting that it's hard to give your all to a sport that you've clearly fallen out of love with.
Perhaps even more disconcerting is the fact that a total of eight players retired injured in the first round of this year's Wimbledon alone. Roger Federer has claimed that players are acting disingenuously by not pulling out when knowingly unfit, instead turning up and retiring injured just to be awarded the princely sum of £35,000 for a first-round exit.
It's fair to say that that while unsavoury incidents are still fairly uncommon, back in the day (whenever that was), they were almost unheard of. Compare the entertaining and often harmless antics of John McEnroe to Russian Daniil Medvedev throwing coins in the direction of the umpire's chair after his defeat earlier this week or Nick Kyrgios virtually giving up against Richard Gasquet at The All England Club in 2015, and you'd be forgiven for asking the question: is the increase in prize money throughout the sport doing more harm than it is good? If the money isn't to blame for some of the player's more petulant behaviour, then what is?
On the other hand, the resurgence of the aforementioned Federer, and even to an extent Rafael Nadal, has warmed the heart of both tennis aficionados and casual watchers of the game. As someone with a wealth of both titles and riches, the evergreen Swiss star is clearly enjoying his tennis and has already managed to capture the Australian Open this year, making him the second oldest man behind Ken Rosewall to win a major crown in the Open era.
After adding to this with back to back Indian Well and Miami Masters titles, Federer is the deserved 2/1 favourite for the Wimbledon crown in the tennis betting and certainly looks good to add to his already impressive seven Wimbledon titles. After skipping the entire clay court season in order to recharge for the grass courts, Federer is the embodiment of the ultimate professional and the antithesis of the attitude displayed by some of the other more controversial figures on tour.
One would like to think that the fines being handed to players in serious breach of the rules will act as deterrents with regards to future behaviour. However, with a total prize pot of over $40m at Wimbledon alone this year, a $20,000 fine here and there really won't make much of a dent in the bank balances of most players inside the top 50.
Tomic himself has earned almost $5m in prize money at the age of 24 while tennis's perhaps most controversial figure, Kyrgios, has earned almost the same amount at the tender age of 22. In light of recent events, one thing is for certain: tennis is in need of players like Federer and Nadal who are still playing the game with genuine love and enthusiasm well into their 30s, and the younger players could do worse than follow their lead in this regard.
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