‘King Kyrgios’ reveals the story behind his UTS nickname

Nick Kyrgios has revealed the origins of his UTS nickname, ahead of the much-anticipated Ultimate Tennis Showdown event taking place in Los Angeles this summer.

In a video shared on the official UTS Twitter page, Kyrgios explains that the origins of his nickname ‘King Kyrgios’ date back to his childhood, when he used that name for his Instagram handle.

Since then, the name has stuck for the Australian as he moved into professional tennis and onto the ATP Tour. Kyrgios explains that the fact he beat Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic at the first time of asking probably helped the nickname stay with him.

“I guess that nickname stuck in the tennis world – tennis fans started bringing signs and wearing shirts with ‘King’ all over it,” he says.

The 2022 Wimbledon runner-up also believes that, as he progressed on the tour, he learned to embrace his role as ‘the bad guy’ in tennis, which also lent itself well to his tongue-in-cheek nickname.

Despite this unofficial position as ‘the villain’, Kyrgios enjoys huge support and has a strong base of fervently loyal fans.

Kyrgios has been out of action all season with a knee injury, after a stellar 2022 campaign in which he reached the Wimbledon final and the last eight of the US Open in an action-packed summer for the mercurical Australian.

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But he looks set to return to action at least by late July – if not earlier – as he is due to compete in the UTS event in LA taking place between 21st and 23rd July.

Also joining Kyrgios at the event will be Frances Tiafoe, Taylor Fritz and Diego Schwartzman in what is a very strong field.

Always a man for the big occasion, Kyrgios will be hoping to add the UTS title to his collection and make this year’s summer as memorable and successful for him as 2022’s was.

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