In less than 24 hours, Alexander Zverev, Stefanos Tsitsipas and Frances Tiafoe all got angry with referees. The latter appear to be the collateral victims of a grueling world circuit.
As if the sky of Shanghai, where rain has fallen in abundance in recent days, had decided to embrace the psychological state of certain players on the circuit. Under the Chinese gray, many have lost control since the start of the Masters 1000. Alexander Zverev, Frances Tiafoe, Stefanos Tsitsipas… In less than 24 hours, three meltdowns made the headlines. A simple wind of revolt against the chair umpires, each time targeted? Probably much more than that.
Amidst the criticism of arbitration decisions, a deep unease can be detected. As if the referees were ultimately just the collateral victims of a grueling world circuit. “Three fucking hours that I fight and that I tear myself away, that I risk my life,” said Frances Tiafoe, for example, after having insulted Jimmy Pinoargote. “You’re sitting on a comfortable chair. I’m working myself to death at 9 p.m. And I’ve been doing it for nine months this year,” Alexander Zverev railed during his spat with Mohamed Lahyani.
Tsitsipas: “A kind of burnout”
The players therefore appear at the end of their tether, exhausted by the length of an endless tennis season. “One of the rare sports where players are left and right for at least 35 to 40 weeks a year,” underlines Christophe Bernelle, former player and head of the mental center at the FFT, in the columns of L’Équipe.
A solitary sport, tennis thus appears like a laundry machine. Recently, Iga Swiatek, world No. 1, used the image of an “endless whirlwind that leaves no moment of rest” to describe the season. Words which inevitably echo the poignant testimony of Caroline Garcia.
At the end of September, the Frenchwoman, mentally exhausted, decided to end her season. “I need to take a break. I need to get away from the constant routine of tennis, take a real vacation, reconnect with my family and loved ones, and allow myself to breathe without the pressure performance”, confided the semi-finalist of the US Open 2022 on her social networks. Now ranked 36th in the world, Garcia says she is “exhausted by anxiety, panic attacks, tears before matches” but also “tired of living in a world where my value is measured by last week’s results, my ranking or my unforced errors.”
After his elimination in the first round of the US Open at the end of August, Tsitsipas expressed similar discomfort. “I no longer have anything to do with the player I was before,” saddened the Greek. “I remember myself when I was younger and playing on adrenaline. I felt like my life depended on the game, but those things have faded away. I feel like there’s a kind of long-term burnout.” And the referees of the Shanghai Masters 1000 are the first witnesses of this.
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