"This tournament is cursed" - Fans shocked by play being suspended at Madrid Open 2025 in unusual incident

The 2025 edition of the Madrid Open has faced its fair share of logistical struggles in the last week. On Monday, April 28, the 1000-level tournament bore the brunt of a nationwide power cut midway through its Round-of-32 action that led to the stoppage of play.

In a bizarre turn of events, Spain and Portugal suffered from power outages on Monday. Since electricity cannot flow without voltage, electrical appliances all over the two countries went out of commission, reportedly, for 15 minutes, which also caused commotion at the tournament.

As a result, Grigor Dimitrov's third-round match against British qualifier Jacob Fearnley at Manolo Santana Stadium and Matteo Arnaldi's battle with Bosnian Damir Dzumhur at Court 4 had to be suspended due to Caja Magica not being able to employ their electronic line-calling and scoreboard systems.

Tennis insider Tumaini Carayol was in attendance during the power cut at the Madrid Open, revealing that the second set of Dimitrov and Fearnley's bout was restarted multiple times before the match was eventually suspended again with the Bulgarian leading 6-4, 5-4.

Tennis fans were subsequently left bamboozled by the above situation, as per their reactions on X.

"Thank god right after she finished her match," a fan wrote on X, referencing Coco Gauff's third-round victory in the first match of the morning session.

"Jfc this tournament is cursed I'm happy we're out of it," another fan insisted.

One fan disclosed that famous umpire Mohamed Lahyani, who was officiating the Arnaldi-Dzumhur match, began calling the lines himself for a few minutes before play was suspended.

"Mohammed Layhani broke protocol and called his own lines in Arnaldi-Dzumhur lol," the fan wrote.

A few, meanwhile, saw the funny side of the incident as they made jokes at the players and the tournament's expense.

"I wonder if the players had enough of the questionable electronic line calls so somebody had to pull the plug…" one fan wrote.

"Who messed with it?" another fan asked jokingly.

"Grigor being so close and this happening," one Dimitrov fan rued his match's stoppage due to the power outage in Madrid.

The Madrid Open has also been hard-hit by controversy surrounding its use of the electronic line-calling judge this fortnight.

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"Not normal, usually the system is very reliable" - Madrid Open's electronic line-calling panned by Alexander Zverev during his 3R victory

Alexander Zverev was unhappy with electronic line-calling in Madrid last week | Image Source: Getty

On Sunday, April 27, Alexander Zverev expressed his disappointment with the purportedly inaccurate electronic line-calling system at the Madrid Open after one of his third-round opponent Alejandro Davidovich Fokina's shots was called in despite appearing to have sailed long. The German implored chair umpire Mohamed Lahyani to check the ball mark before proceeding to take a picture of it to post on his Instagram stories later.

The World No. 2 won the Round-of-32 match in three tough sets and later told the Spanish media that the electronic line-calling system's failure to make the right calls during his match wasn't "normal."

"I hope they don't fine me because obviously, in my opinion, I am completely right and should not be fined for this. This was not normal. Usually, the system is very reliable. Usually, the system has been correct so far in my experience, but what happened today, I don't know," Alexander Zverev said, via Punto de Break.

The Madrid Open has employed electronic line-calling since 2021, prompting various other clay-court events to also adopt the system in the last few years.