12/18/24
June 24, 2004
Umpire screws up in all-important tie-breaker: Instead of calling a second serve, umpire calls a point in favor of Croatia's Karolina Sprem helping her to upset Venus Williams. The question is, shouldn't have someone stepped in and corrected him (Venus??) or did something else happen the AP's not reporting?
How focused could she have been losing while holding triple set point? Big error on the umpires part, but still, she blew it quite well on her own.
posted by pivo at 03:09 PM on June 24, 2004
Tennis games and matches aren't won or lost on one point. Ms. Williams should have made sure the match wasn't close enough to have been affected by a single (possibly bad) call by the umpire.
posted by kirkaracha at 03:51 PM on June 24, 2004
Last year at Wimbledon, one of the male athletes became so agitated about a fan yelling "out!" during play, which did not cause the point to be replayed, that he immediately went into the tank. That was Rusedski against Roddick. Also, tonight, it was strange. The serve was a fault, Williams returned it and the other player smacked it away. The umpire called 2-2, but neither player seemed to notice. She then served again, from the same place, as a second serve, and lost the point. The umpire then called 3-2, and Williams started to serve. It was her opponent who looked more confused though, and she was pretty soon 6-3 down. Williams didn't look put off at all. And then she double faulted , missed a couple of easy volleys, and went out. It was odd.
posted by dng at 04:39 PM on June 24, 2004
I see I've said exactly what AP said. Man, I really should read the links. It was all my football despair which threw me. Sorry.
posted by dng at 05:45 PM on June 24, 2004
posted by dng at 06:27 PM on June 24, 2004
Ms. Williams should have made sure the match wasn't close enough to have been affected by a single (possibly bad) call by the umpire. It wasn't a bad call, it was bad scoring. It was clearly called a fault. The chair umpire didn't call it at all, he added the points wrong.
posted by lil_brown_bat at 07:59 AM on June 25, 2004
I have to question if she was focused, or she's just lost her edge. Either she's more injured than she's letting on, or else the desire isn't what it used to be. What a shame, I hope for Venus that she doesn't realize and regret later in life (like Capriati) how great she could have been by losing focuse mid-career. I was thinking about this too... that before Andre Agassi committed himself to fitness in 1999 and made his ferocious comeback, he might have gone down in history as one of tennis's all-time greatest underachievers. I hope that Venus can get her focus back, honestly I think should could assemble a career record that would rival Martina Navratilova's if she wanted it enough. On another note, at least the chair ump got canned: "I have now discussed the incident with the chair umpire concerned, and we have agreed it will be in the best interests of both parties if he takes no further part in the event," Mills said. On still another note, has anyone been watching ESPN lately? Martina Hingis is looking good. I never thought so when she was playing, but rowr. What's up with her anyway? Is she retired? Injured?
posted by psmealey at 09:59 AM on June 25, 2004
On still another note, has anyone been watching ESPN lately? Martina Hingis is looking good. I never thought so when she was playing, but rowr. What's up with her anyway? Is she retired? Injured? She's currently suing the shoe manufacturer that paid her to wear their shoes. Why? Because they were so bad that they led to a career-ending wear-and-tear ankle injury and she had to retire.
posted by grum@work at 10:06 AM on June 25, 2004
What a class act. +100 pts. Her pops gets +1000pts....he needed it, he was way in the red.
posted by garfield at 10:23 AM on June 25, 2004
I'm sorry, every time I come across this story I read her name "Sperm" instead of "Sprem". Just being honest. *runs*
posted by lilnemo at 06:53 PM on June 25, 2004
*whew* i thought i was the only one.
posted by goddam at 07:12 PM on June 25, 2004
I like Williams' response -- she didn't want to lose focus, so she did not protest the error. Last year at Wimbledon, one of the male athletes became so agitated about a fan yelling "out!" during play, which did not cause the point to be replayed, that he immediately went into the tank.