Victoria Azarenka is one of the more seasoned players on the WTA Tour, and she used her seniority to have a bit of playful banter with noted umpire Marija Cicak before her match against Madison Keys.
Marija Cicak is one of the more prominent umpiring faces around the Tour. She’s been doing it for a very long time and is quite familiar with most of the players. As one of the longest-tenured players on Tour, Azarenka has known Cicak for a very long time.
Due to her position in the players' council, she likely even knows her better than most players, and their familiarity was on full display at the Guadalajara Opej.
The Croatian was the umpire for Azarenka's match against Keys, and before the match, the Belarusian had some harmless fun. Azarenka ventured into a bit of a teasing territory, even though nobody took offence to it.
She told Cicak that she saw her mistake from the match that was played the day before, which prompted Keys to laugh quite a bit. Cicak handled it well, explaining that everybody makes mistakes as they had a nice bit of banter before the coin toss, with the Belarusian starting: "I saw your mistake yesterday."
Cicak didn't take any offense and promptly responded: "Thank you, that's a nice way to start. I take that. We all make mistakes."
The mistake in question was during a match between Belinda Bencic and Sloane Stephens when Cicak awarded the point to the Swiss player following a challenge.
As for this match, it ended up being quite a good one, with Azarenka beating Keys in three sets. Luckily, in this match, the umpire avoided making any significant mistakes. Perhaps the banter was a way for Azarenka to keep the Croatian umpire sharp, or maybe it was just friendly banter.