Roger Federer saluted Thanasi Kokkinakis after losing to the luckless Australian at the Miami Open and relinquishing his world No.1 ranking.
Kokkinakis, ranked 175th, rallied to upset Federer 3-6 6-3 7-6 (7-4) in the second round for the biggest win of his injury-marred career.
The 36-year-old Federer, the oldest man to be ranked world No.1, will lose top spot to Rafael Nadal when the new rankings are released on April 2.
"I deserve it after this match," Federer said.
"That's how I feel."
Kokkinakis became the lowest-ranked man to beat a No.1 since then-world No.178 Francisco Clavet upset Lleyton Hewitt in 2003. That match was also at Key Biscayne.
"Pretty crazy. I'm pretty happy about it," ," Kokkinakis said after teeing up a date with Fernando Verdasco, who beat fellow Spaniard Guillermo Garcia Lopez 4-6 6-0 6-2.
Federer has long admired Kokkinakis, twice inviting the youngster to train with him in Dubai.
"I've always liked his game," Federer said.
"I'm happy for him that on the big stage he was able to show it. It's a big result for him in his career, and I hope it's going to launch him."
The clash was Kokkinakis' first official match against the Swiss superstar.
"I've trained with him a bunch of times and he's a great role model for the sport, but I took what I learned and played my game and executed," Kokkinakis said.
Federer has lost back-to-back matches for the first time since 2014, a dip that comes after a career-best 17-0 start to the year.
He won't be playing anytime soon. He said he'd skip the clay season for the second year in a row, including the French Open.
Sunday's match turned when Federer played a poor service game and was broken at love to fall behind 3-1 in the second set.
"That game I knuckled down and put pressure on him," Kokkinakis said.
"I started to dictate from there."
The tournament is just the fifth for Kokkinakis in seven months, but he said he thought he could beat Federer.
"When I'm playing on my terms, I don't feel there are too many people that can go with me," he said.
"I just needed to play my game and aggressive tennis."
Fourth seed Alexander Zverev, eighth seed Jack Sock, 10th seed Tomas Berdych and 35-year-old Spaniard David Ferrer all progressed to the third round, as did Kokkiinakis's countryman Nick Kyrgios, who crushed Serbian Dusan Lajovic 6-4 6-1.
Other second-round winners were Pablo Carreno Busta, Kevin Anderson, Sam Querrey, Fabio Fognini, Borna Coric, Karen Khachanov, Denis Shapovalov, Steve Johnson and Frances Tiafoe.
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