Bernard Tomic of Australia celebrates winning the third set against Alexandr Dolgopolov of Ukraine during their men's singles match at the Australian Open tennis tournament in Melbourne January 20, 2012.TIM WIMBORNE/Reuters
Bernard Tomic should take a good long rest at the end of a season to forget, former Australia Davis Cup captain Roger Rasheed urged on Tuesday in response to media reports that the 20-year-old had been involved in a brawl.
The Gold Coast Bulletin reported that police were called to separate Tomic and a friend in the early hours of Monday morning, just over a week after the German-born player celebrated his birthday.
Tomic last year accused local police of victimizing him and he will face a magistrates court hearing on motoring charges stemming from those incidents next week.
"I wouldn't hit another ball if I was Bernard Tomic. I would just sort everything out, see where I'm at ... if it took him three months now, six months or whatever it took him," Rasheed told Sky Sports Radio.
"You need to sort out the basics and the platform otherwise it'll raise it's ugly head again. It's unfortunate."
Australia's great young hope who signed a deal with renowned sports agency IMG at the age of 13, Tomic had a breakthrough year in 2011 when he reached the quarter-finals at Wimbledon.
After peaking at 27th in the world rankings in June this year, however, Tomic has slumped to 49th on the back of a string of first and second round defeats since the French Open.
To make matters worse, he has been dubbed "Tomic the Tank Engine" after fading in the latter stages of defeats at the U.S. Open and Shanghai Masters.