Tomic the Tank Engine Strikes Again

DC Crawford
Alternative Perspectives
2 min readJan 15, 2022

--

Serial quitter Bernard Tomic quits Australian Open Qualifying

“Don’t you know who I am?” (Graham Denholm/Getty Images)

Serial Quitter Bernard Tomic was belted out of Qualifying for the 2022 Australian Open of Tennis earlier this week by Roman Safiullin, losing 6–1, 6–4 in just 57 minutes.

According to the ABC, Trailing 1–2 in the second set, Tomic told the umpire at the change-over that he thought he had Covid-19.

“I’m sure in the next two days I will test positive, I’m telling you,” the 29-year-old said from his chair.

“I’ll buy you dinner if I don’t test positive in three days, otherwise you buy me dinner.”

Digging deep into his bag of quitting tricks, Tomic played the “Freedumb” card and questioned the umpire about why there was no official PCR testing for players, with only a rapid test being required.

“They’re allowing players to come on court with rapid tests in their room, c’mon … no official PCR testing,” he said.

After a brief check from the trainer, who couldn’t confirm or deny that Tomic had Covid-19, Safiullin then toweled the Serial Quitter up in just 23 minutes.

Tomic has a long history of quitting matches when the going gets tough. In 2017 he most famously tanked a first-round match at Wimbledon, claiming later that he faked an injury because he…

--

--

DC Crawford
Alternative Perspectives

Surfer, environmentalist, sports coach/administrator & academic, writer, husband, father, friend (not always in that order) views are mine only — let’s surf.