The French Tennis Federation and Roland Garros organizers announced on Friday that Paraguayan Adolfo Daniel Vallejo will be fined for making “unacceptable” comments about a female referee after his 6-3, 7-5, 3-6, 2-6, 7-6 (8) loss to 17-year-old French player Moise Kouame.
The 22-year-old Vallejo made a comeback after coming out of a two-set hole at Court Suzanne Lenglen on Thursday. However, in a five-set match that lasted almost five hours, he fell short of achieving his potential come-from-behind victory.
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CLAY reported that Vallejo later told the outlet that the games she played “required a male referee” and that “it’s very difficult for a woman to do that.”
According to CLAY, Vallejo elaborated, “It has to be a male referee because it’s a very demanding crowd and it takes a lot of force to counter the crowd.”
The match was supervised by Brazilian referee Ana Carvalho, but Vallejo felt he was unable to properly control the noisy crowd on a hot Parisian day and was unable to deal with Kouame’s “lying on the floor” and “stalling”.
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Players are entitled to a maximum of 25 seconds between points. However, as ESPN reported, if the crowd gets rowdy after a point, referees typically use their discretion when deciding to start the countdown.
“The crowd was very insane, but I understand that they were rooting for their countrymen,” Vallejo told CLAY newspaper. “It was a pretty intense crowd, so I was preparing for it. I knew it was going to be like this, but to be honest, it didn’t hurt me, it actually strengthened him.”
According to CLAY, Vallejo admitted that this type of situation is difficult to referee, but it is no surprise that his comments drew anger and reaction from the powers that be at Roland Garros in general.
“The competency of an umpire is not determined by gender, but by their professionalism and ability to officiate at the highest level,” said a statement from the FTT and Roland Garros tournament organizers, via tennis reporter Michal Samulski.
“The outcome of a sporting event, whether positive or negative, can in no way justify or excuse such statements.”
The statement added: “Roland Garros strongly condemns all sexist comments, regardless of who makes them, and stands behind the match officials and all tournament referees more broadly.”
Vallejo, currently No. 71 in the APT rankings, said on social media Friday that his words were being taken out of context in the widely circulated CLAY report.
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According to ESPN, Vallejo wrote about X in Spanish: “I never spoke about women in general. I spoke about the referee in particular. I did not address the crowd at any point during the match.” “However, I didn’t say we lost because of her. I congratulated my opponent and it’s normal for the crowd to cheer for the home players.”
However, the posts have since been removed or deleted.
Kouame becomes the youngest player to reach the third round of a Grand Slam since Spanish legend Rafael Nadal did it at Wimbledon in 2003 at the age of 17. Kouame’s next match is against Chile’s Alejandro Tabilo on Saturday.
