Stefanos Tsitsipas commented on his clash with the umpire following his loss to Daniil Medvedev at the 2024 Shanghai Masters.
There seems to be an epidemic of players clashing with umpires at the 2024 Shanghai Masters. There have been numerous instances, most recently when Frances Tiafoe cursed out the umpire following two time violations, which cost him the first serve, and also when Alexander Zverev clashed with the umpire in his match.
Tsitsipas now added his name to the list of players who had a clash with one of the umpires, and his case was almost identical to Tiafoe's, even though his reaction was much different.
During his match, the Greek player received two time violations from umpire Fergus Murphy. The second one came in the second set when he was leading 2-1 and serving, and he lost 15-30 in that game.
It was a crucial point, one that he ended up losing after the time violation and loss of the first serve, as well as the match, which Medvedev won in two sets 7-6(3), 6-3.
Already during the match, Tsitsipas complained about the umpire's decision, even demanding him to call the supervisor, over which they clashed as well, as Murphy insisted there was no reason to call the supervisor.
After the match, Tsitsipas had time to analyze the situation, and he described his feelings in a post-match interview with Ziggo Sport, explaining that he felt that the umpire's decision was 'not very smart.'
"The umpire definitely wasn't very smart of the decision he took today during the match. Very disappointing to see that an umpire had to come to a decision like that during such, I would say a good match, because, I felt like like both of us were giving it out all on the court, and it felt like we were able to produce a good match from that point onwards."
The Greek player felt like he was playing a good match and that the umpire chose to join him and his opponent in it by making the decision to take the first serve away from him with the time violation.
"The umpire decided to join us in that good match and make it a drama for no reason. So it is definitely disappointing, because I felt like I was at a good state there, and, I felt like they took away something from me for, no reason. Absolutely no reason."
While claiming during the match that he was the only player receiving time violations, Tsitsipas said after the match that he also saw Tiafoe's match, where a similar situation happened. As a result of these two instances, he called for the umpires to use more common sense and compassion in such situations.
"I probably would have been two seconds late of what the shot clock is. From what I saw, it happened yesterday in one of the matches as well. In my my opinion, the empire should use a little bit of common sense in this type of situation and not overcomplicate things."
According to the two-time Grand Slam champion, given the physical nature of their match, if his opponent had used a couple more seconds, he would have completely understood it.
"I would completely understand if it would have happened to my opponent, for two or three seconds. It's absolutely normal, especially when we were rallying and playing so long and making it so physical."
"You need a bit of rest in between points to try to recover and recuperate. So, very unnecessary from the referee, and it probably also shows how by the book is."
The 26-year-old hasn't been the only one complaining. Novak Djokovic, one of the sport's biggest names, if not the biggest, also voiced his reservations regarding the new rule.