'Should Not Work Rest Of Tournament': Gauff's Coach Enraged By Umpire's Call
WTA
Coco Gauff's coach, Brad Gilbert, was left furious with the questionable umpire call in her match against Karolina Pliskova at the 2024 Dubai Championships.
The match was a really complicated affair for Gauff, who needed three sets to get it done. Unofruntalely, as it sometimes happens, the main story coming out of the match wasn't her play, wasn't her victory, or even the play of Pliskova.
It was Gauff clashing with the umpire after Pierre Bacchi made a questionable call that the American thought was wrong. She demanded to see the supervisor, but the umpire wasn't willing to fulfill her request, so they continued arguing for a few minutes.
Eventually, the match continued, and Gauff won it, but her coach, Brad Gilbert, was left furious with the whole situation. Gilbert has been in tennis for a very long time, and he has seen many things and calls, so his harsh criticism certainly echoed in the tennis community.
"At a 1000’s should be absolutely mandatory to have electronic line calling, and this umpire should not work rest of tournament in my humble opinion."- Brad Gilbert on the incident
After seeing more replays of the situation, Gilbert argued for incidental challenges that could be used to resolve such situations.
Gauff obviously couldn't challenge the ruling in any way, but a replay could have shown that she was actually right and should have been given the point as opposed to what the umpire actually called.
"This is exactly why you should have incidental challenges."- Gilbert argues for incidental challenges
As an idea, it does make sense because it's there to be as insurance. It's not there to question every single call of the umpire, which might be the optics of it, but just insurance, which is good for everyone involved on the tennis court.
