Nick Kyrgios has confirmed that he is currently working alongside fellow player and doubles specialist Jamie Cerretani during the later part of this season.
During an interview with The Courier Mail, the 23-year-old confirmed that he has ‘officially’ added the American player to his team. It is understood that the partnership will start as a short-term agreement. At this week’s Japan Open in Tokyo, Kyrgios played in the doubles qualifying draw with Cerretani. The duo lost in the second round.
“James is my coach now — you can quote me on that one,’’ Kyrgios told The Courier Mail.
“We have been working for a while now, especially the last couple of weeks.
“We’ve been talking on the phone a lot (in recent weeks), but starting in Tokyo it’s the first week we have been working together officially. It’s going well.’’
Jamie Cerretani & Nick Kyrgios wins over Yusuke Takahashi & Yousuke Watanuki.@yyusuke1017 @W412Yosuke pic.twitter.com/YXQL4PnPBw
— 木下グループジャパンオープンテニス (@japanopentennis) September 29, 2018
37-year-old Cerretani is currently ranked 65th in the world for doubles, but has been ranked as high as 45th in 2008. He has won four titles on the ATP World Tour with the last occurring at the 2017 Ecuador Open. Cerretani graduated from Brown University in 2004 with a degree in Industrial Relations and Business Economics.
It is unclear as to how the partnership started. On the ATP World Tour, they played each other only once. That was in the first round of a doubles tournament at the 2016 Chengdu Open.
On Wednesday Kyrgios kicked-off his singles campaign at the Japan Open with a 7-5, 7-6(3), win over Yoshihito Nishioka. The world No.27 produced 20 aces and broke his opponent twice during the match to secure the win.
“It’s tough. He’s obviously riding a lot of confidence from last week, coming to your home and playing in front of your home crowd, he was probably looking forward to it today,” the Australian commented about his performance. “It was a good match, I thought. He had a chance in the second set, but it’s never easy playing one of the home favourites.”
In the second round Kyrgios will play French eighth seed Richard Gasquet. He trails their head-to-head 2-5, but they haven’t played each other since 2016.
