Alexander Zverev was involved in a heated exchange in his match at the 2024 Shanghai Masters, and the German failed to control his emotions again in his latest contest.
Zverev arrived for the penultimate ATP Masters 1000 tournament in Shanghai after missing the China Open in Beijing due to a health scare. He was hospitalized with a lung inflammation, something which will likely take two or three months to fully clear.
Despite that issue, Zverev decided to compete at the Shanghai Masters. The 27-year-old got off to a positive start by easing past Mattia Bellucci in straight sets, with no controversial incidents during that contest.
This year’s French Open runner-up had to work much harder to win his round-of-32 match. He faced the talented Dutchman Tallon Griekspoor, who Zverev defeated in a five-set during his run to the final at Roland-Garros.
The pair’s contest at the Shanghai Masters was also terrific viewing. Zverev narrowly prevailed once again, this time 7-6, 2-6, 7-6, after a match filled with great shot-making from both men from beginning to end.
However, the quality of tennis did not generate the most attention. In the first set, Zverev was furious with umpire Mohamed Lahyani for calling a double-bounce, adamant that he got to the ball first.
The German accused Lahyani and the other umpires of “fu***ng up the whole tournament, but replays showed that the Swedish umpire was correct. The ball clearly bounced twice before Zverev reached it.
Some may have expected the 2020 US Open runner-up to keep a lower profile after being incorrect about that incident, but that was not the case during his round-of-16 match against David Goffin.
Zverev lost the opening set 4-6 to the Belgian veteran. The 33-year-old is playing great tennis at this late stage of his career, and his higher-ranked opponent struggled against him.
A tight second set was locked at 5-5 15-30 on the No. 2 seed’s serve. Zverev cracked in the following two points, and his anger afterward was palpable, although he expressed it differently from the incident with Lahyani in the previous match.
As seen in the video below, after he lost the point to go 15-40 down, Zverev smacked the ball against the advertising boards, between a line judge and a ball kid, the latter of whom was shocked and flinched afterward.
Zverev will probably defend himself by saying he would never be in danger of misdirecting his strike as a professional, meaning the ball kid or the line umpire was never in any danger. However, that does not make giving the child a shock like that acceptable.
Goffin won the following point to break, and Zverev responded by hitting the ball high into the air. The two-time ATP Finals champion certainly did not cover himself in glory with his actions on back-to-back points.
The German failed to break back and fell to a 4-6, 5-7 defeat. Zverev’s actions overshadowed what was an excellent performance from Goffin, a hard-working player who has earned this late-career surge he is having.
