His memory seems to have been diluted in the collective imagination and that victory against Djokovic in Australia appears in the middle of a difficult to clarify nebula. Hyeon Chung He is one of the most injured young tennis players and there are strong indications that something may be wrong with his recovery complex. The South Korean burst into the elite in 2018 and astonished locals and strangers with his physical game, leg power with powerful displacements and bomb-proof backcourt solvency. He became an entertainer of the circuit for two seasons and his achievement in the Open de Australia 2018, reaching the semifinals, it served him to explore the top-20 and present himself in society.
Many will remember that that duel against Federer ended with the retirement due to injury of the good Hyeon in the middle of the second set. The physical and technical transformation that Chung made as a player in the top-100 was so drastic that it caused a disorder in his entire body that he has not managed to get out of. His weak point is his back and minor injuries have been systematically concentrated on it, slowing his progression, forcing him to retire in his last match of that successful 2018, against Fognini in Stockholm.
It cost him a lot to acquire competitive rhythm, he played with pain, he risked not to lose ranking and turned to the ATP Challenger Tour in an attempt to perpetuate himself in positions that would give him access to the big events. It seemed to reengage in the US Open 2019, where he passed the preliminary phase and came to face Nadal in the third round, but the problems multiplied. The stoppage due to the coronavirus pandemic was a before and after for a player who had to experience a specific episode that made his back problems much worse. This is clear from the fact that he played only 4 games since the restart and his last appearance was in the previous phase of Roland Garros 2020, where he showed a very worrying tennis level and evidence that something was not going well on a physical level. Since that defeat with Renzo Olivo, silence has prevailed around Chung.
And it is that the last relevant news that was had of him dates from January 19, more than 3 months after that fateful meeting. The South Korean communicated on social networks that he had undergone surgery on his back to solve his problems and that everything was fine. Just 11 days later, a photograph was uploaded complying with a commercial agreement with one of its sponsors and from there, nothing more absolute. Total lack of official communications, absence of news on whether he is training or not, lack of prospects of reappearing and, ultimately, negative signs. The back is a very problematic area for tennis players and if an injury becomes chronic it can ruin an entire career.
Hopefully not the case of Hyeon Chung and his silence is due more to a desire to maintain privacy than to a negative course of events. The ATP circuit needs players as special as him, capable of beating the best when he was fit and of offering tennis as colorful as it is powerful in his great moments. We will have to be very attentive to possible news, but a halo of uncertainty hangs over a figure who broke into the elite with unusual force, but who has disappeared from it with the same emphaticness.
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One Response
A very sad turn for a very promising player. I hope he makes a comeback.