Over the years, there have been several strange reasons why tennis matches have been delayed. One such instance occurred at the ongoing China Open ahead of the qualifying match between Quinn Gleason and Jiayi Wang. The match was delayed for a few minutes, but it wasn’t because of the weather or problems with the court.

It was delayed because Wang accidentally got locked inside the bathroom right before the match. Gleason let her fans know about the incident through social media, where she made a hilarious post about the incident.

“A v quick 2nd plot twist – opponent currently locked in bathroom awaiting rescue,” she wrote on an Instagram story.

The match wasn’t delayed for long and began soon after Wang got out of the bathroom. She delivered a solid performance in front of her home crowd and clinched the match 6-2, 7-5. This result saw her qualify for the second qualifying round.

Despite converting the four break points that she earned, Gleason didn’t prove to be much of a challenge for Wang. The American was pretty weak on her serve and suffered seven breaks during the match. Though Wang wasn’t great on her serve either, she was good enough to hand Gleason a straight-set defeat.

Wang was initially supposed to face Ukraine’s Dayana Yastremska in the second qualifying round. However, the latter was awarded a place in the main draw following a high number of player withdrawals from the tournament. So, her clash with Wang was cancelled.

Instead of Yastremska, Wang will be taking on her compatriot Zhuoxuan Bai in the second round of qualifying. A victory here is crucial for both, as it would send them to the main draw. There were several Chinese players who participated in the qualifying rounds of the tournament, but only a handful of them have reached the second round.

Other than Wang and Bai, the likes of You Xiaodi, Ma YeXin and Shi Han are the only ones to have reached the second round. Another player who can join this list is Yao XinXin, but she is yet to play her first match. It remains to be seen how many Chinese qualifiers will manage to reach the main draw.

Coming back, while Wang getting locked up in the bathroom was certainly a bizarre reason for the match to be delayed, there are various other strange reasons why tennis matches have been delayed or disrupted. As tennis courts are generally open venues, outside factors can end up affecting matches on some occasions. The same happened at the Italian Open earlier this year, where a match was suspended for quite a surprising reason.

Italian Open quarterfinal was bizarrely disrupted due to smoke

The clash between Rafael Jodar and Luciano Darderi had to be suspended for 20 minutes after smoke from the nearby Coppa Italia final affected visibility at the Foro Italico. The soccer match took place approximately 500 metres away from the court.

Inter Milan defeated Lazio 2-0 in the final at the Stadio Olimpico. The celebrations of the triumph quickly went beyond the stadium walls as fireworks exploded in the night sky. The smoke from the fireworks didn’t take much time to reach the Foro Italico.

The issue became serious for players and fans alike as visibility was seriously affected. At first the play continued, but things soon got worse with Jodar leading 6-5, 15-0 in the opening set.

The smoke became so dense that the electronic line-calling system stopped functioning properly. Darderi refused to play in such conditions as he was barely able to see the ball.

As a result, the officials had no choice but to halt the match until the smoke drifted away from the venue. Fans in the stadium watched in disbelief as the strange scene unfolded, and the match was delayed due to the smoke.