From Disqualification To Mixed Doubles Title: Incredible Story Of Miyu Kato At Roland Garros

| by Evita Mueller

Japanese player Miyu Kato saw her Roland Garros experience conclude with a happy ending as she ended up with the mixed doubles trophy.

It was a very crazy event for Kato who has been one of the better doubles players this year alongside her longtime partner Aldila Sutjiadi. They were disqualified from the doubles event following an unfortunate sequence that saw Kato hit a ballgirl with a ball.

Due to the default, Kato was forced to forfeit all of her prize money earned which was a major hit for a player who hasn't earned a lot in her career so far. It was a controversial decision that split the tennis community with many like Navratilova arguing that the decision was ridiculous.

A vocal minority argued that the default was justified with Nick Kyrgios chiming in that it's according to the rules. Even Djokovic's PTPA got involved branding the decision too harsh. One thing that many did agree though was that the behaviour of Marie Bouzkova and Sara Sorribes Tormo wasn't very good.

Kato and Sutjiadi faced each other in the mixed doubles semi-finals with Kato and Tim Puetz ending up as the winners of the match, and eventually also the tournament giving the Japanese player a satisfying end to her experience in Paris.

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During her speech, Kato confirmed that she will launch an appeal to try and retain her prize money and points from the doubles which many would deem fair. Her doubles partner Tim Puetz further thanked Roland Garros in the post-match press conference for allowing them to continue which was against the standard applications of the rules in place.

Just to sum that up, we haven't really had a chance to say also, yeah, a thank you to the tournament, to the grand Slam board, to the supervisors, whoever, we don't know who is actually involved in that, but the standard procedure would have been to take us out of mixed, as well. This would have been standard procedure. If they had just gone by the rules, we would have been out.

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