It says something about Australian teenager Nick Kyrgios’ grand slam debut at the French Open that world No.10 Marin Cilic is wary of their second round match up on Wednesday.
The 18-year-old, the world’s top-ranked junior, caused a boilover with a straight-sets upset of tough Czech veteran Radek Stepanek on Monday.
The youngest player in the main draw, world No.262 Kyrgios only earned a wildcard at Roland Garros after the injury withdrawal of compatriot John Millman.
But he made the most of it in a 7-6 (7-4) 7-6 (10-8) 7-6 (13-11) win.
He described the feeling of winning his first grand slam match as “10 times better” than his junior Australian Open triumph in January, but the big-serving, 193cm teen has little time to reflect.
After beating world No.52 Stepanek, Kyrgios faces another steep rise in class against Croatian Cilic in the second round on Wednesday.
The pair hit together during practice last week and Cilic, who also caught a glimpse of Kyrgios’ victory, was clearly impressed.
“He (Kyrgios) is going to be really motivated,” said Cilic, who cruised past German Philipp Petzschner 6-1 6-2 6-3 on Monday.
“Stepanek is a difficult guy to play, so it shows he’s really talented and dangerous.”
However, Kyrgios was under no illusions about the difficulty of the task he faced.
“He’s obviously an unbelievable player,” Kyrgios said of Cilic.
“He got to where he is playing world-class tennis. I just have to focus on what I have to do in the next couple of days.”
There were seemingly endless positives to come out of Canberra-born, Melbourne-based Kyrgios’ opening performance at the claycourt grand slam.
He was positive and aggressive, taking the game to his older opponent with a rock-solid serve and powerful ground strokes.
He also showed a nerve well beyond his years at crucial times, staving off five straight set points in the second-set tiebreak.
Refreshingly, though, Kyrgios spoke of how much work lay ahead of him.
Asked why fewer players seemed to be breaking onto the tour at his age, he said: “I mean, to win a grand slam you have to possibly play best of five sets every match.
“So, yeah, I’ve still got a long way to go physically, I think.
“I’m obviously continuing to work on that every day.
“I guess it’s obviously a lot of pressure as well. I was feeling that.”
The 2013 junior Australian Open champion has slashed his ranking by almost 600 spots since the start of 2013 and more than 1000 in the past year.
He’s chosen to base himself in the secondary locker room this week to avoid being star-struck by the likes of his idols Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal, and he still plans to play in the junior event.
His win followed opening-day losses by Lleyton Hewitt, Marinko Matosevic and James Duckworth on Sunday.
Bernard Tomic, Samantha Stosur and Ashleigh Barty open their campaigns on Tuesday.
