A seeded women’s doubles pair was disqualified after accidentally hitting a ball girl with an errant ball, with the incident escalated into a crisis by their opponents at the French Open on Sunday.
The 16ht-seeded side of Miyu Kato and Indonesian Aldila Sut Jiadi were DQ’s after opponents Marie Bouzkova and Sara Sorribes Tormo called foul.
The relatively minor accident took on a life of its own when Bouzkova and Sorribes Tormo managed to get the tournament supervisor called to the court.
After consultation with the chair umpire, a default was handed down, resulting in Kato leaving the court in tears.
The end result was a 7-6 (1), 1-3 verdict to the European side.
According to television replays of the incident, the chair umpire originally wanted to let the match go on, but bowed to protests from the other team.
The ballgirl, who was hit in the side of the head as Kato casually lobbed a ball into the backcourt after a point, left the court to an ovation.
The incident was similar to that of Novak Djokovic at the US Open, who was also disqualified after a similar scenario in a 2020 fourth round in New York.
Main photo:- Novak Djokovic was disqualified at US Open 2020 in a similar incident when accidentally hitting a stray ball at a linesperson.
