Roger Federer got in a line judge’s face after receiving a code violation for cursing during his match on Tuesday in Australia.
Federer took the first set of his quarterfinals match against Tennys Sandgren at the Australian Open 6-3 but lost the second set 6-2 and was falling behind in the third set. After going up 0-40 on Sandgren’s serve, Federer blew a triple break point. He hit a ball into the net to make it 30-40 and dropped a curse word afterwards.
Shortly thereafter, chair umpire Marijana Veljovic announced a code violation for cursing. Veljovic was alerted to the violation by the line judge behind the baseline.
Federer asked Veljovic what he said, and she responded that she couldn’t repeat the word, but that she kind of heard it, and the line judge definitely heard it.
Federer then walked from the baseline to confront the line judge and appeared to be incredulous that she told the chair umpire what he said. Rather than get ready to play the point, Federer then approached Veljovic. He seemed annoyed that he was called for a violation despite Veljovic not being sure about what he said.
#Federer receives a warning for an audible obscenity – and safe to say he doesn't agree…
To make matters worse, he's just let slip of 0-40 on Sandgren's serve… pic.twitter.com/vOAc8Vg7K4
— Live Tennis (@livetennis) January 28, 2020
After receiving his explanation, Federer lost another point to make it deuce, and then he blew the game to fall behind 0-3. He then took a timeout.
That was a poor display by Federer. He was obviously upset about his poor playing and took it out on the line judge, who just called him out for something many people heard. He lost his focus and was worried about the wrong thing.
