Nick Kyrgios has sensationally quit his first-round match at the Shanghai Masters in apparent protest against the umpiring.
The volatile Australian stormed off after losing the first set 7-6 (7-5) in a tiebreaker.
Kyrgios’s dramatic walk-off comes a year after he was suspended from the ATP Tour for tanking at the Shanghai Masters and leaves his immediate playing future in doubt once again. The 22-year-old had received two code violations for unsportsmanlike conduct and expressed his dismay at the chair umpire for copping a point penalty during the tiebreaker.
He was picked up on TV telling his courtside entourage he would stop if he lost the set, which he did. Runner-up to world No.1 Rafael Nadal in the China Open final, Kyrgios had been making a run towards the season-ending World Tour Finals before handing Johnson a mid-match walkover.
He was sitting 15th in the Race to London, where the top eight players of the year will assemble for the prestigious round-robin event.
But he will now almost certainly come under serious scrutiny from officials for quitting a match at the very same venue where he was accused of not giving his best efforts 12 months ago.