French Open 2022 Slaps Andrey Rublev and Irina-Camelia Begu With Hefty Fines for Their Unsportsmanlike Conduct in the Second Round

This year’s French Open has given us some fantastic matches and shocking upsets along with some crazy moments. In particular, we saw two incidents that should never happen on a tennis court on consecutive days. On Wednesday, we saw, Andrey Rublev almost hit a ground assistant with a ferocious ball strike.

Then the very next day, the French Open crowd saw Irina-Camelia Begu almost hit a child with her racquet. As a result, the French Open authorities imposed massive fines on both players. 

French Open fines Andrey Rublev and Irina-Camelia Begu

According to recent reports, Romanian tennis player Begu received a $10,000 fine for throwing her racquet and hitting a child in the stands. On the other hand, Rublev received an $8,000 fine for almost hitting a groundskeeper with a ball. 

Now, Rublev immediately apologized for the incident in the post-match press conference. He said, “I lost my mind for a moment, and of course I’m regret for what I did. It’s unacceptable to hit the way the ball I hit it.”

Meanwhile, Begu also felt sorry for the incident, as she didn’t expect the racket to bounce into the crowd as it did. 

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Earlier, Rublev played the second round against the Argentine, Federico Delbonis. After losing the first set, Rublev lost his cool and hit the ball in his chair in anger, which almost bounced off and hit a groundsman.

During Begu’s match, she was on the brink of losing in the third set, when she angrily threw her racket on the ground, which bounced awkwardly and almost hit a child. The startled child started crying, and the chair umpire gave her a code violation. 

Despite the drama, both players safely got through to the third round. In the third round, Rublev will play Cristian Garin while Begu will face Leolia Jeanjean, who created history by beating the no.8 seed Karolina Pliskova. 

A similar incident happened with Novak Djokovic at the US Open 2020

In the 2020 US Open, Novak Djokovic was playing against Pablo Carreno Busta in the fourth round. During the second set, when the Spaniard broke Djokovic’s serve, the current world number 1 smashed a ball out of frustration, and it hit a line judge in the throat. 

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After plenty of discussions between officials, Djokovic was defaulted from the match and the tournament. Later, the Serb apologized for the whole incident. 

Should Rublev and Begu have been punished more severely for their actions? Let us know in the comments.