Over the past few days, Wimbledon has been marred by technological failures. Take the example of the match between Sonay Kartal and Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova. A return from Kartal that landed way out of the line wasn’t caught by the line-call technology and it eventually cost the Russian star the game. However, it looks like the controversy is refusing to die down anytime soon as another major error caught up in the match between Taylor Fritz and Karen Khachanov.

Fritz was serving at 15-0 up at the beginning of the fourth set when the chair umpire was seen having a lengthy discussion with the officials. Subsequently, she announced that there was a technological failure and the line-call system wasn’t available. Both Fritz and Khachanov looked in astonishment as they were left clueless about another major failure at Wimbledon. While Fritz won the opening two sets, the Russian star came back strongly to win the third set and keep the match alive.

While in Pavlyuchenkova’s match, the line-call technology had failed to signal that the ball went out, on this occasion, the line-call system boomed “fault” although Khachanov hit the ball well inside the court. This sparked confusion among everyone present inside the stadium, and the match was halted for a few minutes, with the chair umpire, Louise Azemar-Engzell, engaged in a lengthy discussion with the officials. Subsequently, she announced, “Ladies and gentlemen, we will replay the last point due to a malfunction… The system is now working.”

While on this occasion, not much controversy was caused as the point was replayed, with the rally being in a neutral situation. However, in the match between Pavlyuchenkova and Kartal, the latter lost a game due to the technological error and this caused much stir in the tennis world. After her match, Pavlyuchenkova lashed out at the chair umpire for not intervening although the ball was clearly out from her opponent.

Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova criticized the chair umpire with a strong message

After the match, she called out the chair umpire during the post-match press conference, saying, “I think it’s also difficult for him. He was probably scared to take such a big decision. But I think they should. That’s what they’re there for, sitting on the chair. That’s why we have a chair umpire. Otherwise, I think, soon, let’s just play without them. Right? Then we’re gonna have everything automatic.”

Nonetheless, Pavlyuchenkova kept her calm and went on to win the pre-quarterfinal encounter in straight sets against Kartal. Meanwhile, Fritz and Khachanov are engaged in a close fourth set tied at 5 games all, with Fritz leading by 2 sets to 1. The match can be followed on EssentiallySports’ Live Blog.