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During his 6-3, 7-5 win over Denis Istomin in Miami on Saturday, things got a little weird when Andy Murray discovered that he and his opponent had been playing with a women’s tennis ball. Murray takes a look at the ball whilst preparing to serve and immediately walks over to report it to umpire Mohamed Lahyani.

It’s quite a comical interaction, as Murray and Lahyani are both taken off guard by the situation. The commentators hinted that Murray might be angling to play a let but it really doesn’t seem to be the case here.

“Did you find [it] in the flowers,” asks Lahyani. “Give it to me.”

Murray asks Lahyani to tell the crowd that he is not trying to start an argument, he is simply, in the name of fair and proper sporting, removing the rogue ball (the WTA play with different balls, and somehow one of the balls ended up being placed into the rotation with the ATP balls) from play.

“Can you let the crowd know?” asks Murray.

“No,” grumbles Lahyani.

“Why not?” he quips.

All the while the crowd is whistling and Murray is half-smiling about it.

“It’s one of the women’s balls and I could have just hit a shot with it,” said Murray, incredulously.

Murray would later take it up again with Lahyani at the changeover.



After the match, Murray explained the situation. Here’s the word-by-word from the press transcript.

Q. Could you talk us through the great ball mystery, please?
ANDY MURRAY: It was just a women's ball. I saw it just before I was about to serve. It's quite off putting because I just missed two balls long. I didn't know if that was one of the balls I used in the last couple points. The women's balls are very different to the men's balls. They're much quicker, smaller, livelier.

Yeah, when you're just about to serve at break point down, you know, you don't want to be using a completely different ball.

So I was just a bit frustrated with that because I didn't know potentially if on of the points before I had used it or not.

Q. How did you find out it was a different ball? Did you hit it and think, Oh, that felt light?
ANDY MURRAY: No. Just as I was about to serve, the Penn logo is in red I think on the women's ball and on the men's ball it's in black.

So, yeah, just saw it as I was about to bounce the ball and realized this isn't...

Q. What did Mohamed say back to you?
ANDY MURRAY: I was just a bit -- I felt like he should have said something to the crowd, because it looked like I was stalling intentionally.

Q. We didn't have a clue, really.
ANDY MURRAY: I said to him, Say to the crowd, because I look like I'm complaining for nothing just now, and I've got the wrong ball that I'm about to serve with at break point.

Yeah, he obviously didn't say anything. It's not his fault. He can't see if it's a women's ball or not. But for the player, it's obviously difficult.

Q. Where did this rouge ball come from? Was it in a flower bed...
ANDY MURRAY: A what? Sorry.

Q. Was it in a flower bed?
ANDY MURRAY: Yeah, I don't know. Possibility. I only saw it when it was in my hand. Possibly. Obviously throughout the day a bunch of balls end up in in the flower beds. Yeah, could have easily come from there.

 

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