The only explanation Daniil Medvedev could offer for the bizarre scenes during his Miami Open defeat to Francisco Cerundolo was that the camera operator might be “drunk”.
Medvedev was preparing to serve in the third set when the wires of the on-court Spidercam got caught up in the umpire’s chair and nearly tipped it over.
Umpire Mohamed Lahyani could be heard calling a halt to the match, saying: “One second, wait there!” as ball boys rushed over to try and steady the chair. Both players also made their way over as Lahyani climbed down from his perch.
Medvedev said: “The thing is that whoever was controlling it [the Spidercam]…I saw it during one game, I was on the return [and] it was moving up and down. I was like ‘why would you do it?’ Because there was no sense, we were playing the point.
“I never saw a point from the Spidercam, so probably he was moving for no reason. And after five minutes, it [the incident] happened, so I don’t know if the guy was drunk or something.”
Lahyani was trying to roll the entangled chair out of the way and could be heard saying “it’s dangerous” on the broadcast footage, while ATP supervisor Gerry Armstrong came on to the court to try and help.
However, after one issue was rectified, it seemed to have caused another with Medvedev walking over to the net which looked like it might have been pulled out of place during the incident. It meant that Lahyani had to leave his chair again and measure the net.
The incident followed one during Victoria Mboko’s win over Mirra Andreeva when the contest was halted for eight minutes because the net broke in the opening set.