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MONTREAL – A renaissance week for Canadian Denis Shapovalov turned into a tennis nightmare last Friday, when he was defaulted from a quarter-final match at the Mubadala Citi DC Open for unsportsmanlike conduct.

But after several sleepless nights, the ranking points and prize money for the entire tournament – which are automatically taken away in a case like this – were restored.

Players unite behind Shapovalov

It didn’t help the Canadian’s mood, though, even though he considered himself lucky the penalties were reversed.

“It’s been an interesting couple of days. First of all, I want to say it was extremely tough on me. I was having a tough time sleeping. It was a stressful couple of days for me. Obviously, first of all, I want to say I’m thankful that the committee, in the end, decided to reinstate my points and my money. Obviously, I think it was definitely unfair what had happened,” Shapovalov said during his pre-tournament press conference in Montreal.

Shapovalov said that he had used foul language (i.e., an f-bomb), but that it wasn’t “directed toward anybody”, that he was him talking to his team.

“And I had no code (violations) during the match at all. So this could have easily just been a code for verbal obscenity whatever you want to call it. It didn’t have to go further than that,” he said. “Again, I’m not saying that I’m an angel on court. That’s not what I’m saying at all. I definitely deserved a code violation, but that’s where it should have ended. It’s just unfortunate.”

Shapovalov said that, really, “nothing happened”. That it was something that “barely anyone heard”. And he points out that there are so many examples of players who have done far worse, so there’s no consistency in the rules.

He’s right about that part.

“I couldn’t sleep. I wasn’t able to recover whatsoever. The only thing was that I was thinking about for more than 48 hours. So it was a difficult couple of days for me. But obviously, with this decision, it’s definitely helped me relax and be able to focus on the following week,” Shapovalov said. “But for sure, there was a moment after the match where I felt like it was so unfair that I wasn’t sure if I was even going to play this week. Play at all, for that matter. I felt like it was really something that was taken away from me for nothing big that I did.”

Here’s what it looked like.

Not the ending we expected 😮

With Ben Shelton leading triple match point Denis Shapovalov is defaulted 😥@mubadalacitidc pic.twitter.com/F8FetSk3nk
— Tennis TV (@TennisTV) August 3, 2024

The rules state that when there’s an “unsportmanlike conduct” levied – a charge that can lead to a default on first offence without going through the point penalty schedule – the supervisor must be immediately called to the court because the chair umpire cannot make that decision officially.

So that’s what happened. And then, the automatic penalty is that the player forfeits all of their prize money, hotel accommodations and ranking points for the week.

In this case, because Shapovalov was in the quarterfinals, it was a pretty significant hit: $53,240 US, and 100 ranking points.

Those points constitute 20 per cent of his current total. And the effort in D.C. meant a rise of 33 spots in the rankings, to close to the top 100.

Shocker in Dubai as Rublev is defaulted (updated)

“Correct procedures followed”

In the end, on Monday morning, the ATP announced what most had expected – that Shapovalov would have those points and prize money reinstated in the same way that Andrey Rublev, who was defaulted out of a match against Alexander Bublik when was at 5-6 in the third set of a marathon in Dubai in February, had his given back.

In Rublev’s case, that was twice as many points (200) and three times as much prize money ($157,755).

ATP has reviewed an appeal from Denis Shapovalov following his default from the quarter-finals of the ATP 500 tournament in Washington. The fines committee has affirmed that officials followed correct procedures in defaulting the player. However, the committee has concluded that…
— ATP Tour (@atptour) August 5, 2024

That’s still a hefty fine; the fining guidelines for a tournament at the ATP 500 level for this type of infraction are “up to $40,000”.

That number probably got bigger after, when it was all over, Shapovalov dropped another f-bomb on supervisor Roland Herfel.

Different story on court

The match itself was likely not in play, because Shelton held match point at 6-3 in the second-set tiebreak when the incident occurred. Even a mere “point penalty” would have ended it anyway.

Shapovalov had made his third consecutive error at that point, from 3-3 in the tiebreak – including on both his serve points.

On the previous point, which gave Shelton the match point, Shapovalov snapped the racquet, threw it a couple of times, but seemingly intended to play on with it.

How it looked, upon watching the video again, was that Shapovalov, in response to someone in the stands who was heckling him, went over to that side of the court responded with an f-bomb.

Chair umpire Greg Allensworth, who is typically not the type of umpire to make a show, immediately called the unsportsmanlike (which automatically required calling the supervisor).

Dropping an F-bomb on a paying spectator is at a different level than dropping one on anyone else, per the tennis rules. “What you said to a spectator is unacceptable. You cannot speak to a spectator like that,” Allensworth told Shapovalov.

Shapovalov protested. “What are you talking about? Give me a code (violation), but don’t call the supervisor. What are you talking about? I’m allowed to swear,” he said. “He’s talking to me; I’m going to tell him off.”

Allensworth said he didn’t hear what the spectator said.

“I heard it,” said Shelton, with a little smirk. The American, who was all the way on the other side of the court at the time, had made his way to the umpire’s chair by that point.

It was unlikely the fan had been at it for awhile. If that were the case, Shapovalov likely would have gone to Allensworth to ask that the guy be silenced or removed. Allensworth told Shapovalov that if he “had a problem” with what a fan said, he should come to him.

Shapovalov later told supervisor Roland Herfel that the fan “provoked him”.

So that on-the-spot reaction from Shapovalov, who told the umpire he was responding to a fan getting on him, is a little different than his statement Monday that the obscenity wasn’t directed to anyone in particular, just said towards his box.

Of course, both could be true. He could have been reacting (at least in part) to whatever the spectator said, but not directing his reply directly at him.

Herfel was the same supervisor who had to default Rublev in Dubai.