Taylor Fritz found himself at the centre of yet another Wimbledon controversy during his quarterfinal win over Karen Khachanov on Court 1 on Tuesday.
Just days after being frustrated by the curfew rules, the American was left fuming again-this time due to a glitch in the Electronic Line Calling (ELC) system, which has already sparked debate throughout the tournament. Chair umpire Louise Azemar-Engzell was eventually forced to stop play and order a replay of the point.
The incident occurred in the first game of the fourth set, with Fritz leading 6-3, 6-4, 1-6. As Khachanov prepared to hit a forehand-the fourth shot of the rally-the ELC system suddenly blared a “Fault” call, disrupting the point.
Fritz had missed his first serve at 15-0, and while the system correctly called it a fault, the second serve landed in, and three shots were played before the erroneous interruption occurred.
“What was that?” BBC commentator Todd Woodbridge said. Co-commentator John Lloyd chimed in: “The electronic line system has jumped the gun because that serve wasn’t 121mph, that was the second serve.”
The chair umpire made an emergency phone call to reset the system as the cameras caught Fritz visibly frustrated owing to the delay. The umpire then announced to the crowd: “Ladies and gentlemen, we will replay the last point due to a malfunction. The system is now working.”
Khachanov won the replayed point and broke Fritz’s serve. But the American bounced back quickly to secure a win in a tiebreak and make the semifinals, where he will take on two-time defending champion Carlos Alcaraz.
The All England Club later explained that due to the movement of the ball boy at the time of Fritz’s second serve, the ELC did not start and hence considered his forehand to be the serve, which went over the service line, and hence called out.
A spokesperson said: “The player’s service motion began while the BBG was still crossing the net and therefore the system didn’t recognise the start of the point. As such the Chair Umpire instructed the point be replayed.”
Khachanov, who lost the match, said in the post-match presser that he was not in favour of the new technology which was introduced at Wimbledon this year.
He said: “I’m more for line umpires, to be honest. I don’t know. You feel a little bit [like the] court is too big, too alone without line umpires. At the same time it looks like AI and electronic line calls has to be very precise and no mistakes, but we’ve seen a couple. That’s questionable why this is happening. Is it just like error of the machine or what’s the reason? Like today I think there were a few calls. I don’t know, very questionable if it’s really touching the line or not. At the same time during one point, the machine called it just out during the rally. Sometimes it’s scary to let machines do what they want, you know.”
Fritz spoke much on the same line, as he backed having line judges over the ELC.
“There’s going to be some issues here and there,” said the fifth seed.
“To be honest, I still think it’s much better to just have the electronic line calling calling the lines as opposed to the umpires because I do like not having to think about challenging calls in the middle of points.
“I do like that we don’t have to argue about calls and all this stuff. The ball gets called, and we know, and that’s it. I think it’s a better system.”