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In an extrordinary scene, late at night on a jam-packed side court at the Abierto Mexicano Telcel in Acapulco, Alexander Zverev’s attack on chair umpire Alessandro Germani had immediate consequences.
Not only did he and partner/mentor Marcelo Melo lose the match, 10-6 in the match tiebreak to Harri Heliovaara and Lloyd Glasspool, the German star also wrote his own ticket out of the tournament.
A little over two hours after the end of the match, the tournament issued this announcement.
Aviso importante @atptour
— Abierto Mexicano (@AbiertoTelcel) February 23, 2022
Due to unsportsmanlike conduct at the conclusion of his doubles match on Tuesday night, Alexander Zverev has been withdrawn from the tournament in Acapulco.
On Thursday, per the Associated Press, the ATP announced that Zverev would be fined $40,000 US, in addition to forfeiting the $28,000 US and 45 singles ranking points he had earned at the tournament before he was withdrawn.
The $40,000 is evenly split between penalties for “verbal abuse” and “unsportsmanlike conduct”, and are the maximum that can be assessed under the fine structure.
The ATP also stated it “would undertake ‘a further review of the incident.’ ”
If Zverev ends up being slammed for a “conduct detrimental to the game” violation, a major offense, the penalties could be higher.
Bad idea from the start
It always felt like a bad idea for Zverev, who had been up all night after the latest finish ever to a professional tennis match Monday against American Jenson Brooksby, to even take the doubles court late Tuesday.
But he did.
And after earlier, milder complaints about Germani’s umpiring, a call on a service return by Glasspool with the German/Brazilian pair, down 6-8 in the tiebreak, was the flint for Zverev’s astonishingly explosive flame.
Both he and Melo were sure the return was wide (and, indeed, from a million miles away, they might have had a case). But either there was no review system in place to verify it on the smaller court, or Zverev and Melo had run out of challenges (didn’t watch the entire match, so can’t confirm).
(All screenshots from TennisTV).
(Warning: liberal use of the “f” word).
“Look where the ball bounced.”
“It’s fucking 8-6 in the tiebreak.”
“For fuck’s sake.”
“It’s fucking your line.”
“You fucking idiot.”
For all that, Zverev received one code violation, a warning.
Germani was unmoved. It was 9-6, match point for Heliovaari and Glasspool.
Four swipes of the racquet
After an ace, and some dead-fish handshakes from Zverev at the net, the world No. 3 lost his cool – and Germani was the victim.
Zverev reared back and violently smacked the umpire’s chair – not once, not twice, but three times. The first two, especially, came very near to Germany’s feet and may well have hit them.
“You fucking destroyed the whole fucking match, the whole fucking match you destroyed,” Zverev yelled.
And then he smacked the chair a fourth time as Germani – who displayed remarkable cool at least on the outside – was getting down.
Some in the crowd began to boo.
But only some.
Partner Melo, the 38-year-old veteran who acts as a good friend, mentor and second older brother to Zverev, sat by and said – and did – absolutely nothing.
If inaction is enabling, that’s what that was.
There was an incident along the same lines a few years ago, involving Karolina Pliskova in Rome.
But nowhere NEAR the seriousness of this one.
Poor Andy Murray, who always somehow seems to be heading into press whenever there’s some dramatic occurrence in tennis, did weigh in after his loss to Jannik Sinner in Dubai.
“Look, it was not good. It was dangerous, reckless. I obviously understand lots of players – athletes across lots of sports – can get very frustrated. Certainly me, myself, I’ve not always acted in the way I would want on the tennis court. I’m certainly not claiming to be an angel,” he said. “However, when you’re ripping your tennis racquet right next to the umpire multiple times – yeah, you can’t be doing that.”
Murray, who got his five-millionth (joking) code violation for racquet abuse during the loss to Sinner, also pointed out the flying shards of graphite from the obliterated racquet posed a risk to everyone in the vicinity.
Wednesday morning social-media apology
On Wednesday morning, shortly before 7 a.m. in Acapulco, Zverev issued an apology on Instagram.
That Zverev could have gone from such a supreme effort early Tuesday morning, such a valiant battle against a worthy opponent, and be so gracious towards Brooksby at the net when it was over to … this … is quite a flip.
(Given the hour, he likely “privately apologized” by … text. Or some such. Let’s hope he actually spoke to him).
Dr. Jekyll leaves, Mr. Hyde appears
What happened after that was nearly as extraordinary – and disheartening.
The “other” Zverev suddenly appeared. It was as though he flipped a switch. He went over to the packed stands to hand the racquet – absolutely destroyed at this point – to a kid.
Not only that, he made sure the youngest kid got it.
After that, more extraordinary scenes.
If some in the big crowd were booing after Zverev’s scary attack on the umpire, they quickly turned it around and packed the area at courtside to get selfies and autographs from him.
Zverev, suddenly a completely different person, signed and signed as if it were just another normal occurrence.
The fans’ tacit approval of that behaviour – increasingly and sadly apparent in reactions on social media to the inexcusable abuse of officials in all sports – is on some level part of a greater problem.
Fans crowd around for autographs
To not have the self-control to restrain yourself from attacking an official with a fairly dangerous weapon – because that’s what it was, in Zverev’s hands Tuesday night – was clearly beyond the 24-year-old’s ken in that moment.
But for the fans to just turn the page on it as if it were absolutely nothing is extra level.
No doubt there will be a fine for Zverev, who currently is already under investigation by the ATP for an alleged domestic violence incident involving a former girlfriend at the ATP event in Shanghai a few years ago.
He has denied any wrongdoing.
(That investigation, announced more than four months ago, seems to have fallen completely off the ATP’s radar).
His behaviour early Wednesday morning will do nothing to improve public perception of that series of incidents – if indeed the greater public is even aware of it.
It’s likely to be brought up frequently in the next few days.
Should there be further sanctions?
There has to be, right?
Although if priors give you a window into what might possibly happen, it will probably be something more along the lines of a “suspended suspension”, cleared after a certain period of time during which Zverev has to be a choir boy.
If not, other players will take a cue from Zverev and not be deterred from a loss of control this frightening. Even the most ardent Zverev fans, even those yahoos on social media who think officials have it coming and actually defend this type of behaviour, should have a hard time defending this.
As it is, it’s happening far too frequently.
Chair umpires are human beings. Which means that not only do you not attack them with big graphite instruments because you could seriously hurt them, they also will make mistakes.
And they do. But it should be obvious to anyone possessing half a sense of right and wrong that no one deserves to be attacked in that manner.
(Especially, but irrelevantly, in a first-round doubles match that means absolutely nothing to the man wielding the weapon).
Sports, however, seems to a different universe, especially to fans who tend not to see things clearly when it comes to their favorite player or team.
If it feels as though Zverev, the entitled golden son of an ambitious tennis family, has gotten a lot of free passes in his life, he shouldn’t be allowed to skate on this one.
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