Nick Kyrgios has revealed why he “hates” commentating on Novak Djokovic’s matches and admitted the great Serb “frustrates the hell” out of him. 

The Australian proclaimed that Djokovic “plays around with his food” in matches in the early rounds of Grand Slams.

Kyrgios has worked as a commentator and analyst during his injury-enforced absence from the tour in the last two years.

The 29-year-old covered the Australian Open, Wimbledon and the US Open this year, as well as the 2023 ATP Finals.

The former world No 13 has had a good relationship with Djokovic since defending the tennis icon over his deportation from Australia in 2022 due to Covid vaccine rules.

Prior to this, the pair had not seen eye to eye, with Kyrgios labelling the Serb a “tool” and Djokovic asserting that he did not respect the Aussie.

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Djokovic defeated Kyrgios in four sets in the 2022 Wimbledon final after losing the pair’s first two matches in 2017.

Speaking on the Australian Open’s The Sit-Down show, Kyrgios claimed Djokovic loses focus when he knows the Aussie is commentating on his matches.

“I’ve done a lot of Novak matches and he frustrates the hell out of me because I hate doing his matches early on in Slams,” he said.

“Because he just plays around with his food for like four hours and I’m like ‘I could’ve been in my hotel an hour and a half ago’, and he’ll be up two sets to love.

“Then he’ll lose the third and start complaining and then he’ll go to his box, and there will be a 7-6 in the fourth and I’m like ‘dude, do you just enjoy keeping me here’, because he knows that I’m in there and then he starts losing focus.

“He frustrates the hell out of me, I hate doing Novak’s matches.”

The seven-time ATP title winner went on to name Carlos Alcaraz as one of the players he enjoys watching the most.

“I’ve done a lot of Alcaraz as well and I think he’s probably one of my favourites to watch because he’s so exciting and always has something up his sleeve that I think this tennis world hasn’t seen. He’s going to keep evolving,” Kyrgios continued.

Kyrgios will make his comeback at the Brisbane International in January ahead of the 2025 Australian Open. He has played only one match since October 2022 — in Stuttgart in June 2023 — due to knee and wrist injuries that required surgery.

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