Denis Shapovalov, the world No16, went on a foul-mouthed tirade against the umpire and the Rome crowd on Monday, in the latest angry outburst by a men’s tennis player.
The Canadian was locked in a three-hour battle with Italy’s Lorenzo Sonego in the first round of the Internazionali BNL D’Italia, but was pushed to the brink of exasperation when he disagreed with some umpiring calls.
When a line call went against him, and with no HawkEye being used on the clay courts in Rome, he could not contain his fury. Already on a warning, he crossed the net and automatically got a code violation, earning a point penalty.
Fuming, he called the supervisor, and when the partisan crowd began jeering he turned to them and roared, “shut the f— up!” Bizarrely, when the umpire simply told him “that’s just the rule”, Shapovalov appeared not to know the basic protocol and ranted: “No it’s not. It’s stupid. That’s so unfair.”
At the end, when he eventually emerged the 7-6(5) 3-6 6-3 victor of the fiery three-setter, he apologised to the umpire, saying: “I’m sorry, I know you’re just following the rules.”
“I mean, [I had] never obviously done it before, otherwise I would have known the rules,” Shapovalov said of his action. “It was the heat of the moment so I got emotional. I need to be better with my behaviour.
“I apologised after. Obviously it was my mistake… I just need to improve with handling myself about that. I’ve played in Rome a lot of times. The fans love me here and I love the fans. So I think there’s a huge love. Even after the match, there were a lot of people standing, waiting for pictures.”—AFP
