Change the rules before a player dies
TENNIS CHIEFS WARNED OVER STARS’ HEALTH IN EXTREME HEAT CONDITIONS
TENNIS chiefs were warned a player could die at the US Open unless matches are halted in the scorching heat.
Referee Brian Earley announced the first-ever Extreme Heat Policy in the tournament’s 50-year history with players allowed a 10-minute break between the third and fourth sets if a player asks for it.
Novak Djokovic took an ice-bath during the break in his victory over Marton Fucsovic as temperatures close to 100F were compounded by stifling humidity levels.
The women’s tour introduced an excessive heat policy in its rule book in 1992 but there is nothing concrete on the men’s tour. Lithuanian Ricardas Berankis (below) hit out after he became one of five men to retire due to “heat illness.” He said: “The ATP doesn’t have a heat rule but they should stop the matches. They will not make a change until someone dies. We are fit but this was too much. It is dangerous out there. “They should have cancelled the matches. It was not healthy.” Italy’s Stefano Travaglia, Argentine Leonardo Mayer, Mikhail Youzhny of Russia and Serbian Filip Krajinovic all joined Berankis in citing the heat for retiring. Mayer who was 6-4 6-4 4-6 2-1 down to Serbia’s Laslo Djere when he quit, said: “I had heatstroke. I was not going to die on the court, tennis is not for that. In the locker room I saw several people lying there, just like me. I could not do it any more.”
Fans have also been struggling to cope in the boiling Big Apple with temperatures soaring again yesterday. Some have required medical attention with little shade on outside courts.
In one of the most bizarre episodes of the season, France’s Alize Cornet was given a warning for temporarily taking her top off.
Having gone off court to change, the 28-year-old realised she had her top on back to front and quickly changed it but was called for a code violation.
Former Australian tennis player Casey Dellacqua called Cornet’s warning “ridiculous.”
US Open organisers later apologised for handing out the punishment.