Roddick tweets apology after outburst

Thursday 21 January 2010 13:46 GMT
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Roddick swore twice at the umpire
Roddick swore twice at the umpire

It was a moment reminiscent of John McEnroe's famous "You cannot be serious!" line.

Andy Roddick berated a chair umpire with a stream of expletives at the Australian Open yesterday but later acknowledged on social networking site Twitter that he might not have been "100 per cent right."

Roddick won his second-round match against Brazil's Thomaz Bellucci 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 but left in a huff and to the boos of the crowd - without shaking the umpire's hand. It was his second confrontation with officials in as many matches.

The call in question denied No. 7-seeded Roddick the win on his first match point. The ball was initially ruled out, leading Roddick to believe he had won - but it was then challenged by his opponent, Brazilian Thomaz Bellucci.

The high-tech Hawkeye system used to challenge linesmen's calls showed the ball had bounced in and Irish chair umpire Fergus Murphy awarded the point to Bellucci.

Roddick waited until after the match to angrily tell the umpire that he would have gone for the ball if he knew it was in.

"I'm standing there with my racket back - don't you think I'm going to ... hit it?" Roddick shouted, adding a second profanity at the end. "It's not your job to predict if I'm going to hit it. It's your job to decide if I could hit it."

Roddick closed out the match on his second match point.

Then he reviewed the incident on video - and had a slight change of heart.

"I was more wrong than I thought I was out on court," he said in his post-match news conference. "That being said, it was very close. To take away a match point at that juncture in a match, it's a big call."

"I thought I was going to be 100 per cent right," he added. "It's definitely closer than I felt it was while I was on court."

In his first-round match Monday, Roddick tripped over the foot of a line judge and tumbled to the ground. He then stood and reproached the judge: "Move out of the way when you see a player coming."

Roddick, who faces Feliciano Lopez of Spain in the third round, could also face a fine from the International Tennis Federation for his outburst.

Top-seeded Serena Williams was fined a record $82,500 for her tirade at a US Open line judge for a foot fault in her semifinal loss to eventual winner Kim Clijsters. The Williams outburst included more expletives, angry finger pointing and racket waving that US Open tournament director Jim Curley called at the time "a threatening manner."

Roddick was more conciliatory on his Twitter page.

"Apologies for the language today folks hopefully most kids were asleep by the time I went off ...... my bad," he wrote, and also apologized for the handshake snub.

"Did not realize that i didnt shake the umpires hand we were mid argument and i guess it didnt happen not a conscious decision."

Sourced from: The New Zealand Herald

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