Bernard Tomic · Biography

Bernard Tomic was born on 21 October 1992 in Stuttgart, Germany, to John Tomic, a Bosnian Croat from Tuzla, and Adisa, a Bosniak from Brčko, who had left Yugoslavia years earlier. In 1996 the family settled on the Gold Coast in Queensland, where he learned the game while attending Southport State School and later The Southport School on a sports scholarship. A right-hander with a two-handed backhand who stands 1.96 metres tall, he has always represented Australia, with his father coaching him for much of his career.

Gold Coast upbringing and junior years

Tomic stood out early on the junior circuit, winning the Orange Bowl in Miami in the under-12 (2004), under-14 (2006) and under-16 (2007) categories. In January 2008 he won the Australian Open boys’ title, the youngest champion of that event in the Open Era, and in 2009 he added the US Open junior title by beating American Chase Buchanan in the final. He rose to No. 2 in the world junior rankings. That same year, 2008, he played qualifying at the senior Australian Open, his first taste of the professional game.

Early professional career

He made his ATP debut on a wildcard at Brisbane in 2009 and won his first Challenger that year in Melbourne. In 2010 he was part of the winning Australasia side at the World Tennis Challenge, a team exhibition. His breakthrough came at Wimbledon in 2011: entering as a qualifier, he beat Nikolay Davydenko, Igor Andreev, fifth seed Robin Söderling and Xavier Malisse to reach the quarter-finals, where he lost in four sets to Novak Djokovic, the eventual champion. He was the youngest man to reach that stage at Wimbledon since Boris Becker in 1986.

ATP titles and world No. 17

His first ATP title came at the 2013 Sydney International, where he beat Kevin Anderson in three sets. In 2014 he won the Colombia Open in Bogotá against defending champion Ivo Karlović, and in 2015 he retained it against Frenchman Adrian Mannarino. At the majors he reached the fourth round of the Australian Open in 2012, 2015 and 2016, and the third round of the 2015 US Open, where he beat Lleyton Hewitt in five sets before losing to Richard Gasquet. After a semi-final in Brisbane he climbed to No. 17 in the ATP rankings on 11 January 2016, his career high. His fourth title followed in Chengdu in 2018, in a final against top seed Fabio Fognini in which he saved four match points.

Davis Cup and national teams

He made his Davis Cup debut in 2010 against Chinese Taipei, the youngest player ever to represent Australia in the competition. In the 2011 play-offs he beat Stanislas Wawrinka, though he lost to Roger Federer. He was left out of the first tie of 2013 over off-court conduct, but later that year helped win the play-off against Poland that returned Australia to the World Group. In 2015 he led the team past the Czech Republic and into the semi-finals, where he beat Dan Evans in the tie against Great Britain. In 2016 he lost the deciding rubber to John Isner against the United States. He also played the Hopman Cup in 2013 and 2014 and the London 2012 Olympics, where he lost in the first round.

Controversies and sanctions

Disciplinary episodes ran through his career. In 2016 he retired while trailing in the Sydney quarter-finals and was criticised for making no attempt to return a match point in Madrid. At Wimbledon in 2017, after a first-round defeat to Mischa Zverev, he told reporters he had felt bored and had faked an injury; he was fined 15,000 dollars and his racquet sponsor, Head, dropped him. In January 2018 he left the television show I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here! after three days. At Wimbledon in 2019 he lost to Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in 58 minutes, and the referee withheld his entire £45,000 prize money for failing to meet the required professional standard.

Decline and return (2019-2026)

After 2019 he went years without reaching another ATP semi-final. In 2020 he played only Delray Beach before the pandemic, and in 2021 he came through qualifying at the Australian Open before losing to Denis Shapovalov in the second round. In 2023 he won an M15 event in Las Vegas against Thai-Son Kwiatkowski. On 19 July 2026 he won the Lincoln Challenger in Nebraska, his first title at that level since 2018, beating Mark Lajal 4-6, 7-6, 7-6 after saving a championship point. Later that month, as a lucky loser in Los Cabos, he beat fourth seed Karen Khachanov 6-2, 6-4 to reach his first ATP quarter-final since 2019, where he lost to Cameron Norrie. In October 2026 he qualified for the Shanghai Masters and lost in the first round to Matteo Arnaldi, 6-3, 6-1.