An elbow injury sidelined Nick Kyrgios in recent months and gave the world No. 24 time to reflect on his season.

Kyrgios candidly called his spring season "a mess" following his three-set comeback victory in Stuttgart today. 

Watch: Kyrgios Cool Tweener

The 23-year-old Aussie burst out to a 7-1 start, including claiming his fourth career title, and first on home soil, in Brisbane. Since then, a nagging elbow injury has limited him to six tournament matches. 

"It's been a mess, to be honest," Kyrgios told the media in Stuttgart. "I had such a good start to the year. I was feeling so good. Obviously, won Brisbane, fourth round of Australian Open and played a good match against Grigor [Dimitrov].

"My scheduling, my management of my load was just terrible. I just got injured."



The fourth-seeded Kyrgios, who will face Feliciano Lopez for a place in the Stuttgart semifinals, said the toughest thing about his rehab was residing in a tennis twilight zone in which he was traveling the tour to rehab, but unable to compete because of injury.

"The last three months have been tough. I haven't been able to be home because there's no one I can really train with," Kyrgios said. "So I've had to be traveling to these tournaments, not really playing. Being away from home, not really playing, doesn't really make sense to me.

"It's good to get back out there, but the last three months have been brutal, to be honest. It's been tough."

Photo credit: @BrisbaneTennis