Troubled Australian tennis player Bernard Tomic has been offered “health and wellbeing” support as his career hits the rails.
Once mooted as a rising star, his ranking has plunged to 145 in the world during a forgettable season in which he admitted he was “bored” and not always giving 100 percent. He is now reliant on being handed a wildcard for his home Grand Slam, the Australian Open, in January, with the troubled star widely seen as at a crossroads.
Australian Open director and CEO of Tennis Australia Craig Tiley said the sport was doing what it could to help him, but admitted he had not responded to their offers. “We have reached out to Bernie from a health and wellbeing point of view and it’s up to him to respond,” he told the Sydney Morning Herald Wednesday. “We have been reaching out to him ... he is in a tough place right now. His ranking has dropped and he is struggling – we have all seen it. Our job as a federation is to make sure we have a team of people there to support beyond tennis and that is where we are at.”
He did not detail what assistance had been offered, but said ‘our athlete department has a group of people that support athletes that need help’.
“I don’t know if Bernie does – I am just saying we have made that offer for him.” Tomic, 25, has long had a fractious relationship with Tennis Australia and earlier this year admitted he had no love for the game, saying it is just a job and he felt “trapped”.
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