“I’m sure people are going to be telling me ‘you’ve got to get the ranking up’, but for me, I haven’t been thinking about that at all – it’s more about getting healthy, getting back playing and enjoying the competition.

“The tour is ridiculous, comparatively to any other sport it’s absurd really the amount of travel we do. It’s a tough sport, especially if you’re from Australia you don’t see your family and friends for six, seven, eight months.

“You look at guys like [Daniil] Medvedev towards the end of last season … you’ve got guys like that who are starting to lose their mind a little bit because the season is just too long, and he’s super disciplined.

“The season’s way too long, I’m sure everyone can agree with that.”

The length of the season has drawn the ire of players across the globe, with leading stars Carlos Alcaraz and Iga Świątek joining Thompson in voicing their displeasure at the number of mandatory tournaments.

Loading

While Thompson’s ideal Australian homecoming involves spending as much time at the beach as possible, he lamented in that short window he must continue fitness training in preparation for the next tournament.

Australian Open seedings are only determined the week before the event, meaning the opening tournaments of the campaign – the Brisbane International, Adelaide Open and United Cup among them – can still have a final say in how the competition takes shape.

Thompson, who decried the sport’s anti-doping inconsistencies which left his doubles partner Max Purcell banned from the Australian Open, declared there were “a lot of things in our sport that need cleaning up at the moment”.

“It’s a joke, our off season. We’re starting the 2025 season in 2024, it’s a joke,” Thompson said, after his Brisbane International win against Matteo Berrettini.

“It’s a tricky one, especially for us Aussies. We practically leave after the Australian Open, and we don’t come back until the Davis Cup is finished – the season is that long – so we come back at the end of November and are away for 10 or 11 months.

“It literally feels like we get three weeks off if you play Davis Cup. I don’t know how the 2025 season starts in 2024, it’s a joke, we should be playing next week.”

Get alerts on significant breaking news as happens. Sign up for our Breaking News Alert.