(Provided by Tennis World USA)
Swedish tennis player Mikael Ymer has been fined $40,000 by the ATP for his Lyon meltdown. Last week in Lyon, Ymer absolutely lost his cool when he started smashing his racket against the chair of the umpire. In his round-of-16 meeting against, Arthur Fils, Ymer and Fils were tied to five games and the score was 30-30 on the Swede’s serve.
In the next point, Ymer was 100% certain that Fils’ ball was long. But the chair umpire refused to check the mark and just awarded the point to Fils. After Ymer got broken in the 11th game, the Swede lost his call and started smashing his racket against the chair.
Ymer was immediately disqualified from the match.
Ymer’s statement on the Lyon outburst
“With all due respect, I think it’s pretty clear from the video what caused it and why I reacted the way I reacted. Not justifying it at all, of course.
But for me to sit here and to explain? I think it’s pretty clear what led me to that place. I think that’s pretty clear in the video,” Ymer said. On the court in Lyon, Ymer ranted that the chair umpire did something he never saw before.
“Yesterday I hit a serve against Gasquet, he walked over to the other side and he was still allowed to ask for a mark to be checked. I hit this ball, and you’re telling me you’re not even gonna come down and check the mark? I have never witnessed that a ref says: ‘I’m not gonna come down and check the mark.’
It doesn’t happen,” Ymer ranted at the chair umpire. On Instagram, Nick Kyrgios gave support to Ymer. “Typical umpire not doing their job correctly. All he has to do was just check the mark, regardless,” Kyrgios wrote in the comment section of Tennis TV’s Instagram post. The general expectation was that Ymer would receive a massive fine.
