Will Nalbandian be Suspended?

Written by: Staff on 18th June 2012

Will Nalbandian be Suspended?

epa03269900 Line judge Andrew McDougall (C) is consolded by Argentina's David Nalbandian (L) after Nalbandian kicked boarding into McDougall's shin during the Aegon Tennis Championship final in London, Britain, 17 June 2012. Marin Cilic won by default 6-7, 4-3 after Nalbandian had injured the line judge. EPA/ANDY RAIN |

Remember when John McEnroe became the first player in the 22 years of Open tennis to get kicked out of a Grand Slam tournament for misconduct when he was ejected from the 1990 Australian Open for being cited for unsportsmanlike conduct three times in a match against Mikael Pernfors?

Well, David Nalbandian might be the first notable player banned from competing at Wimbledon since most of the players boycotted the tournament in 1972 to protest the suspension of Nicky Pilic.

On Sunday, Nalbandian was defaulted from the Queen’s final after kicking an advertising board into the leg of a linesman Andrew McDougall’s left leg, causing the wound to bleed.

Nalbandian had won the first set from Marin Cilic 7-6, and at 3-3 in the second set, 15-40 for the Croatian, on the Argentine’s serve Cilic scalded a return that Nalbandian couldn’t handle while running to his right. He then kicked the board hard into the lineman’s leg.

He was disqualified from the tournament, and lost all of his prize money and points from the tournament. He will also likely be fined an additional $10,000 dollars.

But here’s where his future will get interesting: Nalbandian was already hit with an $8,000 fine at the 2012 Australian Open for allegedly throwing water at a staff member following his five-set loss to John Isner.

ATP Rules state that a player incurring two such major fines could be face an eight-week suspension based on having committed a second cumulative on site offense in a 12-month period.

Nalbandian apologized to the crowd, the linesperson and his fans, but then also stuck out at the ATP.

“Sometimes you feel so much pressure from ATP to play a lot of tournaments,” he said. ” Trying to play in wet conditions and ATP don’t do anything for us. And today I do mistake and sometimes I disagree with that. Everybody do mistakes and I don’t feel have to end like that, especially in the final…There is a lot of rules and sometimes [the ATP] don’t do anything. The rulebook is very big and I can tell you that ATP does a lot of mistakes to players and nothing happens. Players disagree to ATP.”

Longtime ATP supervisor Tom Barnes said he had never seen an official injured so badly by the actions of a player. He added that he believed Nalbandian when he said he did not intend to harm the linesman.

Tournament director Chris Kermode said: “Anyone who saw it … it was very clear. It was sort of a red card in football. You’re off.”

ATP CEO Brad Drewett weighed in, saying: “David certainly did not mean for this to happen, however, the rules are very clear in a situation like this and causing injury to someone is an automatic default for any player.”

Now the question is whether the ATP will move quickly enough to make a decision as to whether Nalbandian will be suspended in time for Wimbledon which starts next week, and also whether the Grand Slam itself will respect the decision.

Topics: 10sballs.com, Andrew McDougall, David Nalbandian, John Mcenroe, Marin Cilic, Mikael Pernfors, Nicky Pilic, Tennis News