Spanish player Alejandro Davidovich Fokina on Thursday morning suffered a controversial exit from Wimbledon 2022 when he lost at the hands of Czech player Jiri Vesely.
Fokina lost in the second round after a brilliant first-round win at Wimbledon that saw him take out the No.7 seed Hubert Hurkacz in five sets.
While trailing 9-7 in the fifth set tiebreak against Vesely on Court 17, Fokina hit a ball in anger out of the court before he started to prepare to face double match points. Then he was penalised a point by umpire Carlos Ramos and lost the tie 3-6 7-5 7-6 3-6 6-7.
Match point is an ill advised time to commit a point penalty pic.twitter.com/gFottACqjM
— Timothy Burke (@bubbaprog) June 29, 2022
Having seen the incident, commentators were stunned. “I don’t agree with it. That’s crazy… what a lousy way to end it,” US tennis great John McEnroe told ESPN.
An image of a dejected Fokina still sitting in his seat after the match had ended, when his opponent had left the court, summed up the mood.
