Nick Kyrgios will return to the ATP circuit in the coming days at the Boss Open in Stuttgart, Germany, drawing Corentin Moutet in the first round as he resumes competitive singles for the first time since January.
The 31-year-old’s entry gives the grass-court warm-up an immediate headline: Stuttgart will be Kyrgios’s first tour match since he was bundled out of the Brisbane Open in January, and his last ATP singles victory remains the first-round win at the Miami Open in 2025 — his first singles win since the run to the 2022 Wimbledon final.
Kyrgios has framed the move back to grass as a deliberate step toward Wimbledon. He has said he plays now largely for the crowd — “All I do now is play for the fans,” he said — and that he enjoys performing for younger spectators. He also told reporters in March he has no immediate plans to retire, signaling that the Stuttgart appearance is part of a short-term plan to build toward the Grand Slam on grass.
Stuttgart’s draw is deeper than the headline Kyrgios returns: he meets Corentin Moutet, the French No.34 seed, while the field includes James Duckworth and Rinky Hijikata alongside high-profile names such as Ben Shelton, Taylor Fritz, Frances Tiafoe, Tommy Paul and Alexander Bublik. That list turns a local warm-up into a meaningful test of match fitness and form.
In context, Kyrgios’s decision carries clear physical caveats. He relinquished a singles wildcard into the Australian Open earlier this year and played only doubles and mixed doubles after citing a lack of confidence in his body. Since 2023 he has battled significant wrist and knee issues, and he has admitted those operations and treatments have changed him. “I just don’t think that after you have these surgeries... they kind of pull you down and it’s like you don’t have that belief anymore,” he has said.
The contrast between intent and limitation is the tournament’s central tension. Kyrgios remains a player who once believed himself unbeatable — “When you’re at the top of the sport, I genuinely thought I was unbeatable,” he reflected — but the same surgeries that allowed him to return to court have, by his own account, taken away the absolute conviction that fuelled his peak years. How that affects his movement, serve and willingness to grind through long matches will be the first thing to watch in Stuttgart.
Practical detail for spectators and bettors: the match against Moutet is Kyrgios’s scheduled opener in the coming days; Moutet arrives as the seeded French No.34, a tricky left-hander who can produce low-ball, touch-based variety on grass. A positive showing against a seeded opponent would give Kyrgios immediate momentum; an early exit would deepen questions about whether he can carry form and fitness into the fortnight at Wimbledon, where he reached the final in 2022 and remains a marquee attraction.
What matters next is plainly physical and psychological. Stuttgart will not resolve whether Kyrgios can sustain a comeback through Wimbledon, but it will provide the first competitive answer: does the body hold up under match pressure, and can the belief — eroded, he says, by operations — be rebuilt in the weeks that follow? The outcome in Stuttgart will set the clearest route-map for whatever comes next on Kyrgios’s grass-court push.
