Dubai: Nick Kyrgios and Bernard Tomic are perhaps the errant boys on the ATP World Tour at the moment, and former world No. 1 Roger Federer would prefer that they be just left to themselves for the time-being.

Federer, a shock loser to Russian qualifier Evgeny Donskoy in the 25th anniversary of the Dubai Tennis Championships earlier this week, said he has no advice to the new brigade of tennis stars.

“I would not really comment on this as they [Kyrgios and Tomic] already have enough number of people telling them what to do and what not to do. And I am sure everybody is already sick and tired of all this right now,” Federer told Gulf News during the week.

“I actually think we have a great group of players coming up in the next generation and the good thing is that the ATP is actually promoting all of them. I think that is really exciting and there are a lot of good players there too,” he added.

Ranked No. 17 in the world and seeded No. 6, the 21-year-old Kyrgios fell in three sets in the Acapulco semi-finals to American Sam Querry on Friday. But besides tennis, the Australian has been in the news for all the wrong as well. And if at all, anyone has stopped him from performing on court, it has been Kyrgios and his errant ways.

Last week, the Australian made it to the last four stages at the Marseille Open where he lost to Frenchman Jo-Wilfried Tsonga.

However, his antics off-court have been well documented. Last year, Kyrgios received an eight-week suspension for tanking at the Shanghai Masters in October and the sentence was reduced to three weeks on the condition that he consulted a psychologist.

Earlier this year, the Australian blew away a two-set advantage to lose to Italy’s Andreas Seppi, prompting American legend John McEnroe to label Kyrgios as a “black eye for the sport”. “I think Nick Kyrgios can be a good champion in the future. He is already making great strides as he was already in the semi-finals in Marseille last week and doing well in Acapulco this week,” he said.

In Marseille, Kyrgios blew up at a spectator, sending a mocking wave in their direction after telling them to “shut the f*** up”. The controversy came after he blasted a chair umpire for being “biased as s***” last week.

Tomic has fared no better as he has lost in the first round in four of his past five tournaments since the start of the 2017 season. Playing in a singles match at the Mexican Open, Tomic retired after losing the first set, citing “unbearable heat” despite temperatures being just 28 degrees Celsius throughout his match against American Donald Young. But a couple of hours later, the 24-year-old played in his doubles match with Italian Paolo Lorenzi.

“I also had to learn in the beginning. So they [the new players] also have to learn and get around and find for themselves things like which tournament they want to play, how many tournaments is enough, how much is not enough. This is a constant evolution and they need to just get it right,” Federer noted.

“I’ve commented enough on so many players and maybe I will do that again in the future. But this is not the right time right now,” he added.