WOW.

who saw it and what do people think?

Nalby hesitated for 2-3 seconds waching at line, but he must be alowed to take a chalange. Other umpires even envites to chalange!

I didn't seen it, but the rules state the following:

Timing
A player must indicate her desire to challenge immediately following the point in question. A challenge can also be instigated after an overrule or line call on a serve. If a challenge is not made within a timely manner, the chair umpire may refuse to allow the electronic review. This is the only reason a challenge may be refused.

Source: http://www.livestrong.com/article/108358-rules-tennis-player-challenge /#ixzz1joC6ZKav

Timely manner is very subjective and depends on the umpire. Nouni probably thought that Nalbandian took too much time before he challenged. At least, that's what I think...

Doesn't matter how long Nalbandian took to challenge, how on earth did that moron overrule an Isner serve out wide at such a crucial stage of the match?

What a shame... i would have loved to see Nalvy playing Nadal.

Big shame. Nalbandian is on his last legs of a career, and didn't deserve such treatment. I can think of a few umpires who keep botching matches up, and I wonder how they find themselves time and again on the big stage.

Totally unfair on Nalby, first the Umpire made an overule, which was wrong then he compounds his error by not allowing Nalby to challenge his overrule...........

Why is this whole timely manner issue a subjective thing anyway? Why not give the player something like 10 to 15 seconds to challenge after the call has been made and understood? And I really think chair umpires should be given some sort of verification mechanism before overruling, its not the first time they've made asses of themselves. Let the umpire use hawkeye too if in serious doubt, not just the two players.

I didn't see the match, but the rule should be more specific about what a "timely manner" is. Two or three seconds does not seem like enough time.

disqualify the umpire.

The umpire will usually give you a few seconds if you are engaged meaning you are looking at the line for a mark or questioning the umpire how he saw it. If after the call you start walking towards the other side of the court for the next point then 2-3 seconds later all of a sudden decide to challenge it will be too late. I didn't see the point so I don't know what the scenario was.

yeah the overrule was beyond bad. the decision not to let him challenge can be debated, though.

A new rule should come out of this fiasco...................if an umpire overules a decision, a player has 15 seconds to challenge the decision, 15 seconds from the time the overrule is made................

^^^ thats outrageous. Count 15 seconds to yourself and think about how long that is.

I saw it and I think the umpire was wrong.

Isner was serving at 8:8 in the final set when his first serve was called out but the call was overruled by the umpire. Nalby could have had Adv with the 2nd serve had the umpire not intervened so the crowd was up in arms and Nalby didn't realize that the umpire had overruled the call until he said deuce so he decided to challenge and was refused. I think it was the ATP Rep who came on court but would not listen to Nalby's pleas he just simply encouraged him to accept the call which Nalby had to eventually. Isner then converted the advantage and held his serve. Nalby was evidently agitated so could not hold on to his serve which gave Isner the match.

Later on Eurosport said they were not allowed to show the hawkeye view of the point, but I gather that the serve was a fault. Nalby complained bitterly in his presser.

The way the rule works, it as if a bad call is more important than the few extra seconds the players wait to challenge. Because they are only allowed 3 wrong challenges, they have to be sure before using one of their challenge lives. In a case of an overrule, they should automatically use hawkeye, because obviously it's not a clear cut in or out. The player shouldn't even have to challenge in cases like that.

it was well out (shot-spot didn't even have to zoom in to confirm in or out)

With sports such as tennis and soccer, where linesmen and umpires/referees decide, human errors are part of the game. I think that sports will come to electronical decision making in the future, ruling out the human error factor.

A match is never lost on a single point in my humble opinion, but this was a very big point which could probably decide the outcome!

I've just watched it again, it was actually break point not an advantage point. Bonker, I don't think we should accept human error as part of sports if electronic solution is available.

Nalby was robbed.

nadline - i recapped what happened in the above article. We don't need to speculate what happened. We all know.

It was break point first serve.

I was not speculating, I was just correcting the account I gave in my earlier post.

From the Daily Mail:

Nalbandian ruled out making an official protest, though, believing the evidence was already out there.

'If they really want to do something, I don't need to do anything, because it's on the TV, on the video,' he added.

'But every time we talk to the ATP, it's like nothing, so what is the ATP for, the players or for somebody else?'

Isner, who plays Feliciano Lopez in round three, told ESPN immediately afterwards: 'I didn't know what was going on as I was towelling off. I guess I was just a little luckier out there.'

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/tennis/article-2088266/Australian-Ope n-2012-David-Nalbandian-slams-umpire-exit.html#ixzz1jq7jRAJj

Nalbandian had 2 break points before this controversy and missed 2 easy backhands. They were major choke jobs. Nevertheless it was a bad call. Nalbandian was clearly confused. The umpire should have recognized that and said "I overruled the out call, do you want to challenge?" I remember there was a similar situation at Wimbledon when Roddick didn't realize there was an overrule and was walking to the other side of the court. Mohamed Alanhi got Roddick's attention and told him the ball was good then asked if he wanted to challenge.

official protest wouldn't do anything.

overall Nalbandian handled it as best he could.

I'm very suspicious of seasoned umps who can't get it right in big moments. I guess they can't all be Mohammed. Shame for Nalby, he deserves better.

That overrule is one of the worst calls from an umpire I have seen. Does he need glasses? That serve was clearly out, it wasn't even close. The one thing that hasn't been discussed is the crowd noise. What happened is that Nalby never heard the umpire overrule the out call. If you watched that match, then you know that the noise was deafening. Once he realized that the umpire overruled the call, he asked to challenge.

This has nothing to do with how many seconds. Everyone who watched that match could see what was going on. There has to be discretion when the crowd is screaming and shouting and you can't hear the calls. It's just common sense. We have the challenge system. There was no reason why Nalby couldn't be allowed to challenge.

That old cliche that one bad call doesn't determine the outcome of the match, is not always true. In this case, it did determine the outcome. Insteand of looking at a second serve on break point, the call stood and Isner won the point and the game. I know all about this baloney of being a professional and not letting a bad call get to you, but in this case there was a good reason why Nalby should have lost his composure. He was denied his right to challenge a clearly bad call. How many chances does a player get against Isner? I knew at that point that the match was over. Nalby's concentration was gone.

Nalby played great tennis in this game. At thirty, he doesn't have many more chances. I just don't like to see a match decided on an unbelievably bad call from an umpire.

I also agree with Maya - not every umpire can be Mohanned Llayani. He has eyes like a hawk. If he was there this never would have happened.

Big mistake from Nouni. I think he should get glasses. It didn't really have anything to do with who won the match, though.

Nouni in action:

http://tinyurl.com/83aesmv

@Native New Yorker: I agree with you that one bad call can determine the outcome of a sporting event, particularly if you have close match or game going on.

I just missed seeing the situation on the replay today, but it was apparent that Nalbandian was rattled by what had transpired. I also agree that there should be some reasonable discretion depending on the situation. Simply having a rule that says a player has X number of seconds to challenge won't work in situations where crowd noise or other distractions make it so that one or both players are not sure what the call was or that they should challenge. I don't know what the a workable solution would be, but in a situation like that one, it is a shame that Nalbandian couldn't challenge the call.

Isner seemed kinda proud of himself at the end of the match, which struck me as a bit unseemly, given the circumstances.

Fanfan,

Yes, Isner did come across that way to me. I saw the on-court interview with Pam Shriver and Isner kept talking about how he cracked his racket, as if that was what anybody wanted to talk about. He was kind of blase about the whole thing. Pam Shriver didn't have the guts to confront him about his serve being out according the the hawkeye replay. You could still hear the crowd booing in the background even at that point, so Isner knew what was going on.

I am disgusted with the whole thing. Just unacceptable in a slam match. The umpire did everything wrong, starting with that stupid overrule. He knew that Nalby couldn't hear it over the din of the crowd.

The funny thing is, as I am typing this they are replaying Nalby's press conference from yesterday. This is on the tennis channel, which is covering the matches until espn2 takes over in about an hour and a half. Nalby was beside himself. You can see how upset he was over the whole thing. He said exactly what I said - the noise of the crowd made it unable for him to hear the umpire's overrule. However, he was classy enough to say that he didn't lose the match because of that call. A class act.

Justin Gimelstob started explaining after the replay of his press conference, that tht ATP has no jurisdiction in a slam event. He says it's up to the tournament and the chair umpires. So he said that Nalby's criticism of the ATP was not justified. I did not know that.

oh please NNY and Fedfan. Just stop.

Isner just won a match 10-8 in the 5th after 4 hours and 41 minutes, one year after losing a 9-7 heartbreaker. What do you expect him to do?

And as for the interview, what did you expect? That he would analyze the incident like he was a commentator and not a player? Or like he was Kader Nouni? If you want to know what happened, ask Nalbandian and Nouni--the central figures in the play. Don't ask Shriver or Isner.

Mr. Dimon, what is it that you want me to "just stop"? I made some comments on this story, just as others have. My user name is "Fanfan," by the way, not "Fedfan." I don't dislike Isner, but I am of the opinion that his behavior was inappropriate given the circumstances of his victory. Now, if he was truly unaware of the controversy, I would gladly retract my comment.

I don't think that written anything that justifies your "just stop" comment, especially given the trolling that has been going on here the last few days.

Ricky,

My comments were merely my observations about Isner in that interview. Maybe he was tired and just wanted to get off the court.

I am not blaming him for what happened. I made that clear in my comment. I agreed with you on another topic thread about what happened in this match and who is responsible for this. I agreed that Nalby missed some chances to close out the match.

At this point, I am just going to leave it alone. It's over and nothing can change what happened.

At the risk of being told to "just stop" like some misbehaving child, I will post that I, too, am not blaming Isner for what happened. Players don't have control of what officials do or their rulings on the field of play.

i would consider blaming someone for celebrating winning an epic match as trolling. Maybe it's not, but that's just me.

Anyway, I am all for continuing the debate about this match. But let's be reasonable, folks.

Wow! Mr. Dimon, I'm finding your comments almost unbelievable and unreasonable. If I get banned for saying so, so be it. I said that Isner's behavior was unseemly, given the circumstances of his victory. I didn't "blame" him for anything. I also said that he was not at fault for what the officials do, and that if he was somehow not aware of what happened, I would gladly retract my comment. How the heck is that trolling, especially given the other comments that have gotten by the moderators here the last few days. I did not say Isner was evil, ugly, gets cupcake draws, cheats, should retire, etc. Several others have commented that Nalbandian wuz robbed and had every right to be pissed.

Someone has been coming on here for days making all sorts of nasty comments about Rafa, and to my knowledge, this behavior has gone on unabated with no action from the moderators. I am accused of trolling and told to "just stop" for making a rather mild criticism of a player's behavior. Whatever.

well, Nalbandian WAS robbed!

Nevermind.

Ricky,

Really? Trolling? That's how you read my comments? I have been on this site too long for that. As Fanfan said very well, there have been some really tasteless comments copied and pasted on several topic threads, nasty personal attacks on Rafa and his fans.

Now that's trolling!

I don't think either Fanfan or myself were blaming Isner or being mean to him. I can see how sometimes we put our own expectations on players and their reactions after a match. Maybe that isn't fair. Isner was exhausted, probably not too happy about all the ruckus himself and the controversy that overshadowed his victory and most likely just wanted to move on. He was right - he got lucky. I don't think either of us are hating on the guy. He played a great match. The umpire was the one responsible for the mess.

NNY don't you realise...you're not even allowed to THINK a criticism of Isner....;)

LOLed

NNY - Fanfan, not you

Fanfan @6.07 and NNY @8.20 - well said.

haha...some one had been NEVER that vocal on tennistalk's comments section..hard to find posts exceeding one line from Ricky, understandable , its his fellow countryman but...

it was a good quality match, i have posted the link to a comprehensive highlights package in the other thread that previewd their match..pity david was unable to take that win, the most talented player not to win a slam? :(

I certainly don't think this is on Isner. He's allowed to be happy that he won. He hit a couple of REALLY nice shots in that last game. Especially since Nalbs had 30-0. He earned the win, no doubt about it.

Nouni is the one who should answer for himself. Nalbandian was absolutely robbed and there is simply no way to argue that he wasn't. Not one, but TWO bad calls going against Nalbandian in the space of about 20 seconds. Absolutely outrageous.

I actually thought Nalbandian handled himself well given the circumstances.

In cases like this, the result shouldn't stand, there should be a tie-break re-match with Isner's first service game starting with a 2nd serve.

well put cheryl, isner did what he was supposed to do. after such a monumental effort, he deserved to celebrate .

yeah, Donut Dave handled it EXTREMELY well. Props to him.

nadline at 3:43 - uhhhh what?

Nalbandian fined $8,000