"So at Acapulco, Casper Ruud should kick a ballboy in the shins": Mark Petchey seeing Rublev publicity as positive draws angry reactions

Tennis commentator Mark Petchey has drew the ire of some tennis fans who have reacted angrily after he remarked that the Andrey Rublev line judge drama brought attention to the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships that wouldn't have been there.

Rublev was trailing 6-5 in the third set against Alexander Bublik when he decided to scream in the face of a line judge in Russian which was then reported and he was swiftly defaulted by umpire, Miriam Bley. Players have rallied behind Rublev and called the situation a farce, but Petchey sees it from a commercial angle.

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(VIDEO) Andrey Rublev loses his mind, screams in face of line judge who speaks Russian and gets immediately defaulted in Dubai

"For all those that want all electronic line calling just remember that undiluted passion and drama writes headlines. There are news channels all over the world talking about Dubai that wouldn’t be today, if we had all electronic line calling. Nobody died also," Petchey wrote on X (formerly Twitter).

But those in his replies didn't take the same tact, one wrote. "Okay cool. So at Acapulco, Casper Ruud should kick a ballboy in the shins to get some publicity for this underreported sport. As long as the ballboy doesn't die. Am I doing this right?"

"No I don't agree with this. Tennis shouldn't want to gain publicity from such negative headlines. There are more than enough interesting stories that can gain interest."

"All for publicity. It's best if they play completely naked. In the mud, with music. The newspapers would explode," another wrote. "Oh so maybe tennis events should generate fights between players and more drama just for attention to?" said a further remark. Safe to say that Petchey's viewpoint didn't go down too well.

Read also

"If we take the umpire out, we cannot take off Andrey": Alexander Bublik suggests tennis would be better with electronic line judges after Rublev drama"

Mark Petchey

@_markpetchey

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For all those that want all electronic line calling just remember that undiluted passion and drama writes headlines. There are news channels all over the world talking about Dubai that wouldn’t be today, if we had all electronic line calling. Nobody died also

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opta gayce

@tennisywilliams

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okay cool. so at acapulco casper ruud should kick a ballboy in the shins to get some publicity for this underreported sport. as long as the ballboy doesn't die. am I doing this right?

Mark Petchey

@_markpetchey

For all those that want all electronic line calling just remember that undiluted passion and drama writes headlines. There are news channels all over the world talking about Dubai that wouldn’t be today, if we had all electronic line calling. Nobody died also

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