Towelled: Bad boy Nick Kyrgios in hot water again for shouting at ballboy at French Open
On a chilly opening day, Australian gets code violation during his win over Italian Maro Cecchinato and then rants that umpire Carlos Ramos’ decision was f****** b*******
Controversial Australian Nick Kyrgios and two-time Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova reached the French Open second round on Sunday as Roland Garros got off to a soggy, chilly start.
Kyrgios overcame a first-set code violation to defeat Italy’s Marco Cecchinato 7-6 (8-6), 7-6 (8-6), 6-4.
The 17th seed picked up the warning for screaming at a ballboy on a shivering Court One where the temperature refused to budge above 15 degrees.
Kyrgios insisted he only screamed at the youngster during the first-set tiebreak because he wanted his towel.
He then accused umpire Carlos Ramos of “unbelievable bias” for dishing out the violation.
That was a reference to world number one Novak Djokovic escaping any sanction for shoving the arm of umpire Carlos Bernardes at the Rome Masters last week.
“All of us in this room know that if that was me, it would have been a circus. The fact that nothing happened [to Djokovic] speaks for itself,” said Kyrgios who ranted on court that Ramos’ decision was “f****** b*******”.
“When I get my towel I always say thank you to the ballboys but sometimes you get mad at them,” added Kyrgios.
Despite the controversy, Kyrgios recovered his composure to see off world number 124 Cecchinato and set up a second-round clash against Dutch lucky loser Igor Sijsling.
Kyrgios’s latest brush with the authorities came on a day when heavy rain brought a suspension of action after just four hours of play.
In that time, only nine of the scheduled 32 singles matches had been completed.
Czech 10th seed Kvitova survived a scare to beat Danka Kovinic of Montenegro 6-2, 4-6, 7-5.
The two-time Wimbledon champion was two points away from defeat when she trailed the world number 57 at 4-5 in the decider.
But she claimed the next three games and goes on to face Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei for a place in the last 32.
Hsieh made the second round by beating Spain’s Lara Arruabarrena 7-6 (8-6), 6-3.