You cannot be serious! Wimbledon line-calling system under fire after glitch

LONDON : Wimbledon's automated line-calling technology came under fire on Sunday after an embarrassing malfunction robbed Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova of a point during her last-16 victory over Britain's Sonay Kartal on Centre Court.

Russian Pavlyuchenkova had reached game point at 4-4 in the opening set and Kartal hit a shot that looked clearly long but there was no call and Pavlyuchenkova stopped play.

An automated voice call of "STOP STOP" rang out and confusion reigned as umpire Nico Helwerth sought advice from tournament organisers via telephone.

Television replays showed that Kartal's shot was clearly out, yet Helwerth ruled that because the Hawk-Eye technology had not tracked the ball, the point must be replayed.

Pavlyuchenkova went on to have her serve broken and was clearly fuming at the changeover, telling the umpire: "Because she is local, they can say whatever. You took the game away from me. They stole the game from me. You stole the game from me".

The 34-year-old quickly regrouped and showed the resilience that has marked her long career by reaching the quarter-finals with a 7-6(3) 6-4 win.

But the main talking point was the first big glitch of Wimbledon's automated line-calling system that has replaced human line judges this year.

OPERATOR ERROR

Tournament officials later said the problem had been caused by operator error and that the umpire had followed the correct protocols, although Pavlyuchenkova felt that he should have intervened to correct an obvious mistake.

"We were waiting for a decision as the system was down, but I was expecting to hear if they said the ball was in or out," Pavlyuchenkova told reporters.

"Instead they just said, replay the point. It was tricky especially as it was a very crucial moment in