Stefanos Tsitsipas got away with a controversial move at Wimbledon on Saturday.
Tsitsipas lost 6-7 (2), 6-4, 6-3, 7-6 (7) in his exciting third-round match against Nick Kyrgios.
During the second set, a frustrated Tsitsipas backhanded a ball into the lower level of the stands. He was lucky that the bill did not hit any spectators.
Tsitsipas on the ball incident: "It was really bad from my side. For his part, all the circus show going on on the other side of the net started to become very tiring.
"It didn't hit any people, thank God. For sure I'm never doing that again. But something created that behavior"
— Ricky Dimon (@Dimonator) July 2, 2022
Tsitsipas received a code violation for his move.
Kyrgios began to complain that there wasn’t a harsher penalty for his opponent. The Australian compared what Tsitsipas did to what Novak Djokovic did to get disqualified from the 2020 US Open.
After winning the second set, Kyrgios saying he wants Tsitsipas defaulted for hitting a ball into the crowd and hitting someone.
Tsitsipas got a code violation warning.
Kyrgios calls for the supervisor, then wants more supervisors (lol).
"I want all of them!"
— Ben Rothenberg (@BenRothenberg) July 2, 2022
Kyrgios started ranting at officials after the play. He called one a “disgrace” for not giving Tsitsipas a harsher penalty.
Nick Kyrgios got the proper hump @NickKyrgios 💪 pic.twitter.com/yHWSqWxe55
— Richard K 🏴 (@soberich) July 2, 2022
In addition to hitting the ball into the stands, Tsitsipas also got frustrated and hit a ball off the scoreboard. He received a point penalty for that move. He also seemed to hit a ball towards Kyrgios.
https://twitter.com/theoverrule/status/1543308920575369217
Tsitsipas later apologized for his actions.
Tsitsipas admits the ball incident "was really bad from my side."
"I've never done that before. I did apologise. I don't know what went through my head. I didn't hit any people, it hit the wall, thank God. For sure I'm never doing that again."#Wimbledon
— Gaspar Ribeiro Lança (@gasparlanca) July 2, 2022
The entire match was a circus. Kyrgios hit some serves from unconventional positions. He was ranting and raving throughout the contest, as is his usual style. Tsitsipas was growing frustrated, received coaching, and took a long bathroom break.
The match had just about everything.
