Denis Shapovalov was one point from losing in the quarterfinals of the Citi Open on Friday evening. Instead, he lost a lot more than just the match.
Trailing Ben Shelton by a set and 3-5 in the second-set tiebreaker, Shapovalov netted a backhand that put him in a triple-match point deficit. Before Shelton could serve it out, though, the Canadian appeared to utter an expletive in the direction of a fan. Chair umpire Greg Allensworth immediately called the supervisor to the court and it did not take long for Shapovalov to be defaulted.
Barring a successful appeal (a la Andrey Rublev earlier this year in Dubai), Shapovalov will lose his $53,240 quarterfinal prize money and his 100 ranking points. The latter is especially bad news for an injury-plagued player who is currently ranked No. 139 in the world.
As for Shelton, he advances to a semifinal showdown against Flavio Cobolli.
“I thought I did a lot of great things to get to the finish line,” the American said in his on-court interview. “I thought I served extremely well today and held my nerve again in the tiebreakers when I needed it the most. My clutch tennis has come out; I’m gonna try to keep that going.”
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ouch
Clutch tennis is hardly what Shelton has done most of the year.
I dont get why you can be defaulted for saying one bad word when so many players get away with crap all the time.
Its like double standards.
Never! Ha! Ha! Do you remember when Layani got down from umpire’s chair and gave Nick some counselling? Jaw dropping. Tennis is full of double standards and the “rules” applied differently across tournaments and even within tournaments.
I’ve never seen anyone get away with it like Kyrgios. In this very tournament IIRC. Umpire Murphy was pathetic that day taking constant crap and not replying
Most likely because he directed the expletive at a fan. Most of the swearing that gets warning and not defaults are when a player is cursing to himself or cursing in general. Swearing at another person is considered a higher offense than just swearing.
Well, we’ve all seen players argue with the umpire in a very disrespectful way and not even get a warning.Just because they dont use a four letter word, doesnt make it right .
I heard what the fan said. After shapovalov threw and kicked his racquet, the fan said “the racquet doesn’t like you either.” Hard to see that as a provocation
Denis should not lose his money he earned he deserves the money because he won those matches you have no right to do that
yep, but rules are rules
Shapovalov is repeat offender, few years ago he broke chair umpire cheekbone, in Sydney during ATP Cup match against Nole had a huge fight with fans and told them “f— you” got away with violation code, he badly needs angry management help.
For a while, Federer and Djokovic, more commonly Djokovic because fans loved Roger more – were very creative cussers who didn’t shout at any specific fan, but cursed a crowd in obscure Swiss Canton slang or Montenegran mountain dialect outside the Serbo-Croatian language base.
In a Novak-Roger match with the crowd ragging on Djokovic, he told them he would make them cry and then he would F them and all their mothers.