Andrey Rublev was not happy with his own behavior when he shouted into the face of a line umpire, but he still thinks the punishment is too harsh.
Rublev is a very aggressive player, as he has a well-documented history of doing crazy things on the tennis court. The Russian often hurts himself in various ways, but what he did recently at the 2024 Dubai Championships was too much even for him.
Rublev went over to a line umpire shouting in their face quite aggressively, which isn't accepted on a tennis court and at an ATP event. That sort of thing can't be excusable under any circumstances.
He even agrees with that but still maintains that the punishment he got for that was too harsh, as he explained in a recent interview with Sports Express.
The punishment was actually reduced from the initial one because the default couldn't be reversed, of course, but his points and prize money were reinstated after he was stripped of them, but he still had to pay a fine, but not equal to his full prize money.
"A $36,000 fine and disqualification for the word 'moron'… based on all my career experience, it's too much. Although, if we take my behavior, then I am wrong and, of course, it is impermissible."
"If we analyze the situation as a whole, I think that this is too much. Because I've had much worse situations, and the punishments for them are much milder, warnings with a minimal fine."
It's an interesting stance from Rublev because quite a few people agreed that what he did was out of line and that the punishment was more than justified. It's interesting to see that even after the reduction, Rublev thinks it was "too much." What's even more interesting is that some players took his side.
0 Comments