New Zealand player labels Nick Kyrgios an ‘absolute knob’ after losing doubles match to Australian pair

Kiwi doubles player Michael Venus has unleashed on Australian Open spectators and Nick Kyrgios, labelling the Australian an immature “absolute knob” after losing in the quarter-finals to the “Special Ks”.

Venus and German Tim Pütz went down in three sets to Kyrgios and Thanasi Kokkinakis on Tuesday at Kia Arena, where a raucous crowd supported the all-Australian partnership who had hammed it up for the vocal fans.

Venus, 34, on Wednesday said the sledging from the crowd was at times intolerable and some spectators made comments about him and his family as he prepared to serve.

“It felt like a circus out there and not really a tennis match,” Venus told New Zealand television channel 1News.

“Between serves [they were] geeing the crowd up and getting them to cheer at times like that. I don’t think that’s really on.

“You know if it’s on the other foot, old mate [Kyrgios] would have flipped his lid. He already did get mad there by himself. It’s amazing, he can smash a ball out that hits a kid and just ’cause he gives them a racket afterwards people can say he’s such a good guy.”

The on-court tension between Venus and Kyrgios, in particular, was noticeable and both had words with each other and the umpire over perceived injustices. Kyrgios also mocked Venus’s at-times wayward ball toss.

Venus said on Wednesday that Kyrgios’s supporters messaged him on social media “an extreme amount” but there were also “a lot of messages from other people saying how embarrassed they were with the crowd’s behaviour and they’re sorry, it shouldn’t have been like that”.

“They’ll always be his supporters and he’ll always spin it in a way that helps him but at the end of the day, he’s just an absolute knob,” Venus said.

“On the maturity side, you