Caroline Garcia came within a stone's throw from a default in her Canadian Open first-round match against Marie Bouzkova.
The French player was leading her Czech opponent 4-2 in the opening set, and looked in fine spirits. But things took a turn for the worse when Garcia lost the next three games, dropping her serve on two occasions. The second such moment came at 4-4, when Garcia found herself 0-40 down.
The fifth seed lost the next point, dumping a routine forehand into the net, to get broken to love, before Bouzkova went on to serve for the first set successfully 6-4. Out of pure frustration, Garcia tried to smack the ball to the other side of the court, and very nearly hit the ball kid who was already set in motion to pick up loose balls on the court.
It was a heart-in-mouth moment that drew a huge gasp from the crowd, and Garcia was extremely fortunate her evening didn't end there. Given that the ball was traveling, any sort of contact with the ball kid could have potentially resulted in a serious injury and a default for the French player.
The 29-year-old was issued with a code violation for unsportsmanlike conduct by the umpire during the changeover and tried to argue that there was no malicious intent. It was clear at that point Garcia had lost her bearings in the match, as Bouzkova had tactically outwitted her. Her frustration even boiled down onto her team, as she grew agitated on the court.
Defaults in tennis are becoming increasingly frequent. As per the rulebook, any sort of violent behavior on the court, such as hitting a tennis ball directly at an official or ball kid, will result in an instant default, regardless of whether there was intent or not.
Just a few months ago, there was such an incident at the French Open in a doubles match, that actually involved Marie Bouzkova, when the duo of Kato Miyu and Aldila Sutjiadi were disqualified after the Japanese player inadvertently hit a ball kid. Here's the video of the incident.
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