Irina-Camelia Begu fined $10K for racquet incident at Roland Garros

Irina-Camelia Begu received a $10,000 fine from the French Tennis Federation on Friday for an incident in her match against Alexandrova.

In a moment of frustration, Begu walked toward her bench and threw her racket. The Romanian player had just dropped her serve in the third set against Ekaterina Alexandrova. The racket bounced into the crowd and nearly hit a child, who was visibly shaken and crying. A brief pause in the match followed, and Begu was given a code violation for unsportsmanlike conduct.

Alexandrova was visibly upset that Begu did not get defaulted for her actions. In her own frustration over the chair umpire's decision, she hit a ball over the stands during the next changeover, yelling, "So, I can do that, too?"

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During her post-match press conference, Begu said she did not expect the racket to bounce toward the fans and felt regret for what happened:

"It's an embarrassing moment for me, so I don't want to talk too much about it. I just want to apologize. My whole career I didn't do something like this, and I feel really bad and sorry."

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