Kyrgios reveals advice he got from Ferrer on suffering

Nick Kyrgios qualified for his first US Open four years ago, before losing to fourth-seeded David Ferrer in the opening round. But the Spaniard recognized the Australian’s talent, and gave him a laundry list of advice.

Kyrgios recalled Ferrer’s strongest words after beating the veteran 7-6 (3), 7-6 (4) in the Cincinnati semifinals on Saturday night.

“Learn to suffer.”

If any words could more perfectly represent Ferrer, it’d be tough to find them.

“I think his coach met up with my coach. They kind of wrote down on a big sheet of paper what I had to improve on,” Kyrgios said. “One of the things I know I’ll never forget on the sheet was ‘learn to suffer.’ That’s what David Ferrer said to Nick Kyrgios when I was eating KFC every day, pretty fat, not a great athlete. I was like, I don’t know, this guy is crazy.”

Ferrer saw past the straightforward 7-5, 6-3, 6-2 scoreline in 2013, and had plenty of praise for the then-18-year-old Kyrgios.

“I think he's a very great player,” Ferrer said. “He has a really good serve, a very good forehand, and very good future.”

Kyrgios has proven Ferrer right, and it was only fitting that he reached his first ATP Masters 1000 final before falling to Grigor Dimitrov on Sunday.

And while Kyrgios may have thought that Ferrer was crazy with his advice about suffering back then, he has showed nothing but appreciation for the 35-year-old.

“Yeah, that’s one thing I did remember from the big sheet,” Kyrgios said on Saturday. “He’s always been a really kind guy to me.”

Follow Andrew on Twitter: @andrewikesports