One of the most controversial finishes in recent tennis history occurred in the match between Jack Draper and Felix Auger-Aliassime in round three of the Western & Southern Open on Friday night.
With Draper serving at 5-4, 40-30 in the third set, he appeared to convert match point with a winning volley off the net cord. However, the replay–only showed on television and not actually used on site to review calls–showed that the ball bounced off Draper’s side of the court before going over the net. Thus Auger-Aliassime should have won the point to reach deuce on his opponent’s serve. Instead, it was game, set, and match in Draper’s favor.
Other players were not happy about the blatant error, with chair umpire Greg Allensworth drawing much of their ire. The fact that video review is not being used to help with such calls also isn’t sitting well with the tour.
“Itās embarrassing that we donāt have video replay of these kind of situations on the court,” Novak Djokovic posted on Twitter. “Whatās even more ridiculous is that we donāt have the rule in place that would allow chair umpires to change the original call based on the video review that happens off the court! Everyone who watches TV sees what happened on the replay, yet the players on the court are kept in ādarkā not knowing whatās the outcome. We have Hawkeye for line calls, we live in the technologically advanced 21st century! Please 
respective Tours, make sure this nonsense never happens again!”
Lucas Pouille (translated from French): “It’s a shame. How can such blatant mistakes still be made.. the referee who says that after the match he will admit to having made a mistake, we don’t care.. it’s too late, the match will be over.. when will the @atptour move forward??”
Vasek Pospisil: “This is pretty horrendous on so many levels.. but I have to say, not sure how many players would have handled this situation with such class. So impressive from Felix. Gotta feel for him”.
Andy Roddick: “I feel like every time Iāve ever shanked a ball straight into the ground, Iāve known that I shanked it straight into the ground…. Also if you have the tech, just get the call right ā¦ā¦. Takes longer to argue about it”.
Meanwhile, UTS Chief Operating Officer Baptiste Kern announced on his LinkedIn account that the upcoming event in New York will implement VAR. The U.S. Open will also use VAR on eight televised courts.
Draper is even blatantly lying when he says āI was looking at you not at the ballā when in fact his eyes are all the time on the ball, including the moment he shanked the ball, easily to see on provided video.
It’s like those situations where someone touches the net. How often do they own up?
The match wasn’t tight like those typical scenarios where touching the net becomes a factor. Draper was serving do it the match and had only been broken once in 3 sets. Chances of him losing that game and match were less than 10-5%.
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