Baseline decision halts play in Chennai Open Challenger

The drama happened in the first set when the pairs were locked up at three each during the tie-break. 

The ball was initially called out by the line umpire but the decision was later overturned by the chair umpire who awarded the point to the Indian pair. The scoreboard read 4-3 in favour of the local lads.

Spain’s Zapata Miralles wasn’t impressed with the decision and remonstrated with the chair umpire. The latter changed his mind in a matter of seconds to award the point against Balaji/Vardhan, reversing the scoreboard to 3-4. 

It stirred a heated exchange as Vardhan felt the call wasn’t a “hindrance” when the return shot was played. The ATP supervisor Scott Ray had to intervene and resolve the issue which caused a considerable amount of stoppage. 

After communicating with both the teams, the supervisor decided to stand by the chair umpire’s call of giving the point away to the Indian pair.

When asked about what exactly stirred the altercation with the chair umpire, Zapata Miralles said, “We usually replay the point when the chair umpire overrules the decision. We were not exactly happy with him when he awarded a point to our opponents. We are not going to take this issue to the ATP because for them it is after all a Challenger event.”

Earlier in the contest, the Tamil Nadu duo was bitterly disappointed with some of the decisions in the fifth game of the opening set, with Sriram Balaji taking a jibe at one of the line umpires in the local language.