The end result of Saturday’s third-round match at Wimbledon between Novak Djokovic and Kyle Edmund was hardly the story. Djokovic prevailed in mostly routine 4-6, 6-3, 6-2, 6-4 fashion in a contest that was plagued by controversy.
First, during his post-match press conference the 21st-ranked Serb called the crowd “unfair” in its support of the Brit. Second, a point midway through the fourth set caused a stir throughout the All-England Club–and beyond.
With Edmund serving down break point at 3-3, 15-40 in the fourth set, Djokovic struck what appeared to be a forehand drop-volley winner. Edmund returned it for what was called a winner of his own, but Djokovic’s shot clearly bounced twice.
Chair umpire Jake Garner awarded the point to Edmund even though the underdog should have lost it three different ways:
1. the ball bounced twice
2. Edmund ran into the net before his shot bounced twice on Djokovic’s side
3. Edmund’s shot was wide
“I was 100 percent convinced (about the double-bounce), but everyone can makes mistakes,” Djokovic commented. “It was a very important point. I told the chair umpire that it’s not possible for him to play that shot if it doesn’t bounce twice. It doesn’t make any sense.”
Next up for 31-year-old on Manic Monday is Karen Khachanov, while Edmund was the last Brit to exit Wimbledon and will join the “unfair” English crowd in its support of the national football team. England plays Croatia in the World Cup semifinals on Wednesday.
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Possibly not the worst of all time. (I’m thinking about the strange call during the Goffin-Nadal match at Monte Carlo last year, where it’s not clear that anyone challenged the call, then the umpire ran down, pointed at the wrong mark and declared Nadal’s shot (clearly out) good.) Why didn’t Djokovic challenge the line call? The ball was well out and Hawkeye would have confirmed that. But maybe he was too focused on the double bounce to track the ball’s path?
Btw I thought Djokovic handled the situation very well. Probably helps that he did win the match!
He did challenge it but the umpire said it was too late. Awful call but luckily no material consequence
He explained it well in his presser and he was complimentary of Edmund. The call and some particular fans got to him. But he sorted it and in the end performed very well under the circumstances.
Ridiculous umpiring by Garner but Nole won and I think it made him stronger the way he handled bad call. Good luck, Nole!
Well, I’ve seen worse umpiring (Mariana Alves, anyone?), but in her case, she was deliberately cheating Serena Williams, so it wasn’t incompetence, it was outright prejudice. I doubt very highly if Jake Garner was trying to screw over Novak Djokovic.
Of course that leads to the more pressing concern…if he WASN’T trying to screw over Nole, what exactly was he doing? Because he clearly wasn’t watching the point.