Tennis courts and controversies seem to go hand in hand. The ongoing Shanghai Masters has once again delivered another surprising moment—but this one might be one of the most bizarre yet. In a highly anticipated match between Flavio Cobolli and Stan Wawrinka, an unexpected incident took center stage, potentially influencing the outcome of the entire match. What exactly happened? Well, the specifics of the controversy have left fans and players alike scratching their heads, as it’s something no one saw coming. And the one person who’s certainly not holding back from expressing his frustration is Nick Kyrgios.

The second-round match between Cobolli and Wawrinka was no less than a thriller. With both players winning one set each, the match was forced into a third set, but what followed was probably not expected by anyone. With Wawrinka serving at 0-1 in the third set, he won the first point of the game after Cobolli missed a backhand return. Chair umpire Carlos Bernardes correctly called the score as 15-0 before picking up his walkie-talkie to request some electrolytes for the Italian player. But things turned out to be surprising when play resumed.

Cobolli won the next point against Wawrinka with a soft drop shot. Bernardes called the score again but said it was 0-30 instead of the correct 15-15. While Wawrinka won one point after this to go 15-30, Cobolli claimed the next two and reached 15-40 before breaking serve for a 2-0 lead. This error was not noticed by anyone, including Wawrinka. The score should have been 30-40 had the umpire called out the points correctly. Interestingly, it was the only break of serve in the match, the first two sets of which had gone to tiebreak. With Cobolli turning out to be the eventual winner, 6-7(6), 7-6(4), 6-3, many believe that the call took a crucial turn in the match, and one such voice that arose against the umpire was that of Nick Kyrgios.

Responding to an X post by Journalist and tennis commentator Jose Morgado that detailed the incident, Kyrgios expressed his anger. “BERNARDES SHOILD OF BEEN FIRED YEARS AGO. HOW DOES THIS HAPPEN. Potato,” he wrote. Earlier this season, Bernardes, who joined the ATP tour in 1992, announced that this season would be his last. This, however, is not the first time when Nick Kyrgios has expressed such reactions for Bernardes. 

A similar tussle between the Aussie and Bernardes took place in 2022 during his match against Jannik Sinner at the Miami Open. At 4-4 in the first set, Kyrgios made a good return on Sinner’s serve but was halted due to a noise from Bernardes’s walkie-talkie, which loudly interrupted the play and called for the point to be replayed.

This infuriated the Australian player who said, “You should be fired on the spot.How is that possible? How is that possible! The fourth round of Miami, one of the biggest tournaments, and you guys just can’t do your job.” He continued to take digs at the umpire throughout the match calling his umpiring “outrageous” and “embarrassing.” When it comes to the ATP rulebook, there is not much hope for a player from there, either. 

What do past precedents and the ATP rule book say about scoring errors?

This is not the first time a scoring error from the umpire has taken center stage in a match. Venus Williams also found herself amid a similar situation in 2004 during her match against Karolina Sprem. In the second set of the match, Williams returned the ball during Sprem’s serve, assuming that it had landed in, and Sprem hit the ball back past Williams before she returned to hit her second serve.

However, the chair umpire of the match, Ted Watts, awarded Sprem a point, thereby taking the set to 3-1, which should have stood at 2-1. When questioned about this, tournament referee Alan Mills stated that since no appeal was made by Williams, there was nothing that could have been done.

When it comes to the ATP rulebook, a scoring error can be checked by a Video Review System. However, the facility is not widely available across all tournaments, thereby posing a challenge for the players. For now, it will be interesting to see if more criticism continues to come in for Carlos Bernardes over the entire matter.