It's not always that a pre-match coin toss becomes a talking point of a tennis match, but Alexander Zverev's quarterfinal match against Alex de Minaur raised many eyebrows.
Those keenly watching proceedings just before the match started noted with surprise that Zverev seemed to change his mind after his initial selection during the coin toss.
The chair umpire usually oversees the coin toss before the match begins, which determines the player who will serve or receive first and which side of the court they choose to play from in the first game. It's considered a fair and unbiased method of starting a tennis match.
So, as the two players converged and stood opposite each other, the chair umpire, Damien Dumusois, asked Zverev which side of the coin he wanted to choose. This specific coin at Roland Garros had a ball on one side and the racket on the other.
Zverev immediately chose "ball," which can be heard in the video below. A young fan was given the honor of tossing the coin, which landed on the racket side.
The German picked up the coin and handed it to the umpire, who looked over to De Minaur to ask him whether he wanted to start the match on serve or return. Curiously, Zverev interrupted and said he had selected the ball side of the coin.
Dumusois was quite perplexed and asked him what he wanted to do, to which the fourth seed said he would receive. It was quite a bizarre way to start the match, and several eagle-eyed fans have called out Zverev for "cheating," although we will never know his intentions.
''But if you wanna go, you go," Zverev tried to redeem himself and offered De Minaur the freedom to choose. The outcome of the coin toss did not have a decisive effect on the final result.
Zverev powered past the Australian in straight sets to reach another French Open semifinal. He will play Norway's Casper Ruud in Friday's semifinals.
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