Murray’s cursing, muttering highlight virtual tennis

Associated PressMay 1, 2020, 7:18 PM EDT

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A little glimpse of what a mic’d-up Andy Murray might sound like on a real-life court – cursing, muttering, grunting – provided the highlights for the coronavirus pandemic’s first video game tennis tournament involving pros.

Alas, the gaming itself was full of glitches galore as the four-day event wrapped up Thursday.

Murray and his semifinal opponent for this virtual version of the Madrid Open, Diego Schwartzman, kept needing to stop and start over when there were technical issues both men complained about.

It was left to Murray’s exclamations of “Oh, my God! What was that?” or “This is madness!” or “This has got to be one of the worst matches I’ve ever seen!” to offer a semblance of entertainment, and perhaps a sense of what the three-time major champion sounds like when he’s actually competing.

No one is on the ATP or WTA tours these days, though. The Madrid Open, a clay-court tuneup for the French Open that was supposed to begin Friday, is among more than 30 tournaments canceled or postponed; sanctioned pro tennis is on hold at least until mid-July.

Ultimately, if one of the main purposes of this esports endeavor – aside from giving players and their fans something to do under the COVID-19 lockdown, and offer some money for charity – was to promote the video game being streamed, well, it wasn’t always the best advertisement.

The hiccups made it tough to follow along, creating the equivalent of rain delays. First there was a break of about 2+ minutes. After starting over, they soon were pausing for nearly another 3 minutes before resuming again.

Even after Schwartzman eventually “won,” he said, “I don’t deserve to be in the final,” and declared it made sense for him to bow out and let Murray continue.

Which seemed to fit with the general silliness of the whole thing.

So did some of the unnecessary commentary, which served only to drown out the banter among the players, or to provide, um, insights such as this during Murray’s win over David Goffin in the men’s final (Kiki Bertens won the women’s title with a controller Thursday, a year after claiming the Madrid trophy with her racket): “I just can’t get over the quality of tennis being played by both men here. A real neck-and-neck affair here.”

Cue the eye roll emojis.

At French Open, Francisco Cerundolo is mad at chair umpire over Holger Rune’s double-bounce

Associated PressJun 5, 2023, 8:49 PM EDT

Susan Mullane-USA TODAY Sports

PARIS – Francisco Cerundolo of Argentina was devastated about losing his French Open fourth-round match to Holger Rune of Denmark in a fifth-set tiebreaker Monday. He also was mad at chair umpire Kader Nouni for missing a double-bounce of the ball on a point that was awarded to Rune early in his 7-6 (3), 3-6, 6-4, 1-6, 7-6 (10-7) victory.

They were tied at a set apiece and on serve at 2-1 for the No. 6-seeded Rune early in the third at Court Suzanne Lenglen when the point of contention happened. Cerundolo, who was serving at deuce, hit a forehand that skidded low at the baseline and quickly bounced a second time – which normally would have meant that the point was his.

But Rune went ahead and got his racket on the ball, sending it back over the net. At about the same time, No. 23 seed Cerundolo was saying “sorry” to apologize for the odd way his forehand made the ball skim across the clay. Nouni was not immediately aware of the double-bounce, thought the ball was still in play and called Cerundolo for hindrance for talking during a point. That meant Rune got the point, and when he won the next one, too, he had a service break.

“It was unbelievable, because it was a clear double-bounce. I was mad at the umpire because he has to see it,” Cerundolo said. “It’s his fault.”

In tennis, electronic line-calling is used at many tournaments to make line calls, but replays are not used to check things like double-bounces or whether a point should be lost because a player touches the net, which is not allowed.

And while Cerundolo put the onus on the official, he also thought Rune could have ceded the point because of the double-bounce.

“For sure, I wish he would have done that, because it was a big moment,” Cerundolo said.

Rune, who moved into a matchup against No. 4 Casper Ruud in the quarterfinals, said he saw a replay after the following point, and “saw it was a double bounce. But the point already happened, and he called the score. So I felt sorry.”

But, Rune added: “This is tennis. This is sports. Some umpires, they make mistakes. Some for me; some for him. That’s life.”

Gael Monfils withdraws from French Open with wrist injury

Associated PressJun 1, 2023, 11:34 AM EDT

Susan Mullane-USA TODAY Sports

PARIS — A thrilling five-set victory took a toll on Gael Monfils, whose withdrawal from the French Open handed No. 6 Holger Rune a walkover to the third round.

The 36-year-old Frenchman said he has a strained left wrist and can’t continue.

He battled Sebastian Baez for nearly four hours on Court Philippe Chatrier before beating the Argentine 3-6, 6-3, 7-5, 1-6, 7-5 in a first-round match that ended at 12:18 a.m. local time.

The victory was Monfils’ first at tour level this year, as the veteran was coming back from heel surgery.

“Actually, physically, I’m quite fine. But I had the problem with my wrist that I cannot solve,” he said. “The doctor say was not good to play with that type of injury. Yesterday was actually very risky, and then today definitely say I should stop.”

Monfils reached the semifinals at the French Open in 2008 and made it to the quarterfinals on three other occasions.