The Colsanitas Cup of Colombia left us with a surreal image in the world of tennis with the Australian Astra Sharma as the involuntary protagonist. Sharma saw how, despite winning the points necessary to win the game, the chair umpire awarded the game to his rival, the Italian Giulia Gatto-Monticone.
The events occurred in the third set of the match and 1-1 in the third. Sharma was leading by 0-30 in this third game over the rest when he achieved another point that made it 0-40. Nevertheless, chair umpire Luis David Armenta Castro said the score was 30-15 for the Italian, that he won two more points to take a game that he had lost. That completely detracted Sharma, who would end up losing the set and the match 4-6, 7-5 and 6-1.
Sharma herself showed her outrage on social media after the game. “It's outrageous. I told him I wasn't sure about the score, but since I couldn't tell how I had won the points, I couldn't delay the game by arguing with him.”
The thing did not stop there, since Sharma discussed the situation with the WTA tournament supervisor … who told him to be more aware of the score next time. “Update: WTA supervisor says I should learn the lesson and focus more on the score rather than my tennis in the future. My confusion is not an excuse.”
The also Australian Ellen Perez wanted to come out in defense of her partner after what happened. There are no excuses for this ridiculous mistake by the chair umpire and the supervisor for defending him and blaming the player for not focusing on the scoreboard. It's disgusting. You should be ashamed! “I am sick of the referees being a factor influencing the outcome of the matches,” she lamented.