"Absolutely ridiciulous" - Novak Djokovic-led PTPA's co-founder Vasek Pospisil furious over Denis Shapovalov's Citi Open disqualification

PTPA co-founder Vasek Posipil was furious about Denis Shapovalov's disqualification against Ben Shelton in the quarterfinals of the 2024 Mubadala Citi DC Open. The Canadian is set to lose the prize money and points that he earned during the tournament.

Shapovalov, who has been struggling to get back to his best for quite a while, kicked off his North American hardcourt swing with an opening-round defeat to David Goffin at the Atlanta Open. He then participated at the Mubadala Citi DC Open where he seemed to find his footing.

The 25-year-old kicked off his campaign with consecutive straight-set wins against Roberto Bautista Agut and sixth seed Adrian Mannarino respectively. He then had to fight his way back from a set down to defeat 12th seed Miomir Kecmanovic to set up a quarterfinal clash against second seed Ben Shelton.

The Canadian and the American put on a show of high-quality tennis for the fans but the match met with an unfortunate conclusion. During the tiebreaker, Shapovalov hit an unforced error on his backhand setting up three match points for Ben Shelton. However, the Candian said a few words to someone in the crowd and threw his racket due to which he was defaulted.

Though Shelton seemingly tried to appeal against the decision to the umpire and continue the match, his pleas came to no avail. The match ended at 7-6(5), (6)6-6(3) in the 21-year-old's favor giving him a place in the final 4.

This default meant that Shapovalov would lose all the prize money and ranking points he earned during the week. His compatriot Pospisil, a member of the Novak Djokovic-led Professional Tennis Players Association member took to X (formerly Twitter) to express his anger at the default decision and to ask for for a rule change:

“This rule needs the change. Absolutely ridiculous that someone would lose all their prize money and points for something like this.”

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"We back to complete nonsense again" - Alexander Bublik also expresses anger over Denis Shapovalov's default

Denis Shapovalov (Image source: GETTY)

After the incident concerning Denis Shapovalov at the 2024 Mubadala Citi DC Open, Alexander Bublik took to Instagram to express his anger over Shapovalov's default. He questioned the ATP Tour's decision and asked with seeming sarcasm if a player would be defaulted for looking at a spectator in an inappropriate manner.

"We back to complete nonsense again @atptour? Next time we going to get defaulted because we looked at the spectator the ‘wrong way’ but they can do and say whatever they want? :)"

Earlier in the year, Bublik had stated how taking away umpires from the game would solve a lot of problems.

"This is what we need to understand, that we cannot take players away, but we can easily take away the umpires, and that would solve many issues."

These comments had come after Andrey Rublev was defaulted in the semifinal match against the Kazakh for shouting and lashing out at a line judge at the Dubai Tennis Championships.