Bernard Tomic seems vague about how much he knew of Daniel Evans before the British qualifier dumped him out of the second round of the US Open – but the victor has a sharper memory.
The world No.179 claimed after his 1-6 6-3 7-6 (7-4) 6-3 upset win that Tomic’s father John had refused to allow him to practise with Bernard in Miami last year.
“I was there playing quallies (qualifiers),” said Evans, who has laid his perennial underachiever title to rest by backing up his round-one defeat of world No.12 Kei Nishikori with another handy scalp on Thursday.
“His dad sort of fobbed me off and said I wasn’t good enough to practise with him, yeah.”
If success is the best revenge, Evans has it in the bag.
He has a maiden third-round spot at a grand slam lined up and, on Wednesday, the player who deigned to hit with him was none other than Roger Federer.
Tomic, meanwhile, has revised his rankings wish list after being sent packing prematurely yet again.
The world No.56 made a confident post-Wimbledon declaration that his game had him headed to the top 10 but Tomic has lowered his expectations, saying top-30 by season’s end is the new goal.
With only one win out of the three tournaments he played before the US Open, the 20-year-old admits his season has been patchy.
“Probably similar to last year – just up and down,” Tomic said.
“I don’t know. I play very good. I lose for a few months, then I play good again, then it falls down.”
Tomic’s views his latest flop like his two other second-round exits in New York – another lost opportunity.
Last year, tennis great John McEnroe accused Tomic of “going the tank” in his 6-3 6-4 6-0 second-round capitulation against Andy Roddick and, in 2011, he won even fewer games in a second-round hammering at the hands of Marin Cilic.
There was no sign of the lowly ranked Evans reproducing the magic of his first-round win over Nishikori as Tomic rolled through the first set in 22 minutes.
When asked about why he let the match get away, Tomic conceded he lost his nerve.
“Yeah, just wasn’t going after my shots,” he said.
“Just felt afraid to go after the ball. Wasn’t playing in the court like the first set.
“Just shows you could be up 6-1, 3-love. If you lose that break, a guy comes back in the match – it can change.”
Tomic said he also felt tired and admitted he gets lazy on court.
“I don’t really know how to put guys away,” he said.
“I get off to a good start, I’m comfortable, I’m winning. I can’t really find that edge to close out the match.”
The youngest player in the world’s top 100 blamed his inconsistency on his age.
“You know, it’s tough. A lot of the guys out there are experienced,” he said.
“My tennis is good, but I lack experience.”
Tomic still has ambitions of getting back into the top 30 by the end of the year but said, for now, the focus would be on this month’s Davis Cup playoff in Poland, which Australia must win to get back to the top-tier World Group.
“I’ll work hard because it’s Davis Cup,” he said.
“The tie is very important to us. We had a chance last year and we missed it.”
Davis Cup mainstay Lleyton Hewitt is Australia’s last player standing in New York and will be out to go at least one better than Tomic on Friday when he takes on sixth seed and fellow former Open champion Juan Martin del Potro.
