Challenger Tour player defaulted after walking off court in protest of conditions in Ecuador

The Challenger Tour is the step just below the ATP Tour and a seriously fierce and competitive realm where players try and get crucial ranking points on the board with the motivation of kicking on and climbing up the ranks. For Camilo Ugo Carabelli, it seems that he is not fond of these types of tournaments, based off his last two Challenger Tour events, the most recent in which he was defaulted in for taking his bags and leaving the court.

The World No.75 was the highest ranked player competing in that Challenger 75 event in Guayaquil, Ecuador. He had made it to the quarter-finals after taking down Federico Coria 7-5, 6-2 before qualifier Alex Hernandez retired after just two full games were played.

The fifth seed Joao Lucas Reis da Silva was his last-eight opponent, but it did not go smoothly. Ugo Carabelli broke to go 3-2 ahead, but his Brazilian opponent managed to get himself back level. The No.1 seed then again seized the initiative after Reis da Silva failed to make the most of a 0-40 advantage, but for the second time in the match, he was broken back.

At this point, he was fed up and not willing to play any more tennis in this setting. He was less than pleased with the conditions of the clay courts in this part of Ecuador and took matters into his own hands. Picking up his bags directly after the 10th game, he trudged off the court and forfeited the match.

It was evident that he was struggling in what would subsequently be the last point of the match. Slipping at the baseline while his tame return bounced before making contact with the net, that was his breaking point. Reis da Silva was wandering around at the back of the court getting ready for his next service game, not realising that he had just been given a free pass into the semi-finals.

When the news eventually broke to him, he was seen in the middle of the court celebrating this bizarre victory. The World No.332 Joaquin Aguilar Cardozo is in his way of a second consecutive Challenger Tour final.

That is now the second event in a row on the Challenger Tour in which Ugo Carabelli has made the headlines for the wrong reasons. The last time he featured before this latest episode in Ecuador came in Cancun, Mexico, ahead of the US Open.

He got past his first round match easily enough before Tunisian Moez Echargui would tackle him in the second round. Despite almost 300 places being between them in the rankings, it was Echargui who was the dominant force on court, winning eight games in a row en route to a 6-2, 5-0 lead.

He was one game away from the next round when Ugo Carabelli opted to strangely retire with just one game remaining. After all that time fighting on court not getting anywhere, he left it right until the end to throw in the towel in a bemusing decision. He would go on to lose the opening round of the US Open in straight sets against Jan-Lennard Struff.

The 27-year-old's actions in Ecuador will have consequences. Due to being defaulted, he will not get any of his ranking points and prize money at the end of the event, making it a week to forget.