"The year didn't start the way I wanted" - Dominic Thiem reveals new rib injury diagnosis

Dominic Thiem confirmed that he suffered a small muscle tear in his ribs in his opening-round match against Andrey Rublev.

The Austrian returned to the Australian Open for the first time in two years and sat out the previous edition because of a wrist injury. Despite his best efforts, he did not progress after losing his first match to fifth seed Rublev 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 in straight sets to bow out of the event.

In his most recent social media post, the former US Open champion expressed his disappointment over the result and informed his fans about his latest injury.

"Unfortunately, the year didn't start the way I wanted. Especially in Melbourne, I wanted to perform at my best, but I tore a small muscle fiber in my rib," Thiem said.

The former US Open winner mentioned that the injury was minor and that he should be back on the court soon.

"The results show that it's not too bad, and playing at the Davis Cup should be possible. I will try everything in the upcoming week to get fit and practice well," he said.

The 29-year-old concluded by thanking the Australian Open for his comfortable stay during the tournament and giving him a wildcard for the event.

"Big thanks for the WC at the @australianopen, as always, the event was amazing and definitely one of the best in the sporting world," Thiem added.

"I was playing way worse than I was expecting" - Dominic Thiem on his start to the 2023 season

Dominic Thiem plays a forehand in their round one singles match against Andrey Rublev

While assessing his start to the 2023 season, Dominic Thiem revealed that he was playing "worse" than he had expected.

The former World No. 3 has been making steady progress since returning from injury in 2022 but was not pleased with his performances at the start of the new season.

"In the beginning, it was way tougher than I expected. Also, I was playing way worse than I was expecting, so it was a tough way back, but things changed. Especially towards Autumn, towards the last tournament of the year," he said.

The Austrian hopes to improve his performances during the rest of the year.

"There I was playing pretty decent. As I said, this tournament doesn't change anything because I just had a really tough opponent. Yeah, I hope that I can improve the results at the South American clay," he said in his psot-match press conference.

Thiem added that his goal remains to get back to playing his best tennis and jumping up in the rankings.

"That's the ultimate goal, and I hope that I can do it now during this season if I have a draw like that, like here in Australia against a top-10 player, top-5 seed to go out on court and to believe that I can win it," he stated.