Romanian player Irina-Camelia Begu was lucky not to be disqualified from the French Open on Thursday after she threw her racket and it bounced into the crowd, bringing a young spectator to tears.
The 31-year-old was trailing Russia’s Ekaterina Alexandrova 2-0 in the decider when she threw her racket to the clay in frustration.
It bounced off the bleachers and flew at a boy, not actually hitting him, but startling him to the point where he sobbed audibly.
The match was stopped for five minutes while the tournament supervisor was called to the pitch and the referee was consulted.
Surprisingly, they decided that the world No. 63 would receive only a code violation and a warning, rather than be banned from the match like Novak Djokovic was at the 2020 US Open, when he hit a linesman with a ball.
Begu gave the boy a hug and posed for a photo with him after the match, later saying: ‘It’s an embarrassing moment for me. I want to apologize. My whole career I haven’t done something like this, and I feel really bad and regretful.
Alexandrova contested the decision, angrily kicked a ball off the court and appeared to have lost her stride as Begu won six of the next eight games to finish 6-7, 6-3, 6-4.
The defeated 30th seed wrote on Instagram: ‘Looks like the rules were against me. This shouldn’t be happening. We are responsible for our racket.
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Just three days ago, Russian World No. 7 Andrey Rublev came within an inch of certain disqualification when he slammed a ball into a chair and ricocheted off an outfielder, getting so close to him that he knocked off his cap.