British tennis player Cameron Norrie apologized after throwing his racket and accidentally hitting a spectator during the 6-2, 6-3 loss to Facundo Díaz Acosta at the Auckland Classic.
The former world number 8 threw his racket back in frustration at scoring to put Díaz Acosta on match point, forcing a spectator to raise his hands to stop him from hitting her in the face.
Norrie received a warning but avoided disqualification for the incident, which the spectator appeared to take in good spirits.
“I apologized to the woman, and she was fine…it barely affected her and she was laughing. But I had no intention of doing that, and it was definitely a red flag. he told Radio New Zealand (RNZ) after the match. “I wanted to come here and play well, and it ended up being the complete opposite.
“I didn’t feel comfortable. I was throwing my racket, it doesn’t look like me at all,” he continued.
“As we’ve seen with other players, you can easily get left out if they’re caught in the wrong place or they’re not looking or something like that,” the 29-year-old added, according to The guardian. “I had no intention of doing that and it’s definitely not me to do something like that. I apologized very quickly and I want to apologize in general. I’m not happy with the way I behaved.
Novak Djokovic was disqualified from the 2020 US Open after accidentally hitting a ball at a linesman. In the same way, Denis Shapovalov was found guilty in 2017 when he hit the referee with a ball during a Davis Cup match against Great Britain.
However, at Wimbledon in 2022, Stefanos Tsitsipas was fined $10,000 but avoided disqualification after hitting a ball into the stands during a fiery third-round match against Nick Kyrgios.
Díaz Acosta will face fellow Argentine Sebastián Báez in the round of 16. Norrie, who grew up in Auckland, will be next in action at the Australian Open, having reached the fourth round of the tournament last year before being knocked out by Alexander Zverev. .
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