Storm in Paris: Jodar Pushes the Ball Girl

Rafael Jodar found himself at the center of a controversy at Roland Garros after a video showed him brushing past a ball kid, who then fell to the ground, during a changeover in the third round he won against Alex Michelsen 7-6(2), 6-7(5), 4-6, 6-3, 6-3 in four hours and sixteen minutes, on May 29.

The footage, filmed as the Spaniard was leaving the court for a toilet break, quickly went around social media. Jodar walks toward the edge of the court gesturing in the direction of his corner, the ball kid tries to get out of his path by stepping backwards and falls. The camera angle fed the reading of a deliberate shove, unleashing a wave of insults against the nineteen-year-old from Madrid, ATP number 29 and twenty-seventh seed in Paris.

In the post-match press conference, Jodar rejected that reading. "I didn't push her, I was telling my father to pass me some things. She was in the middle and tripped on the tarp," the Spaniard explained, reiterating his respect for the work of ball kids.

Some figures inside the game also came to his defense. Former doubles world number 1 Rennae Stubbs, after rewatching the footage, wrote that Jodar never touched the girl and that the fall came because of the stiff tarps along the edge of the court, the same ones that in the previous days had already caused injuries to Katie Boulter, Zeynep Sonmez and Alexander Blockx.

What remains is the noise around a day that for Jodar should have had a very different flavor: the comeback from two sets to one down against Michelsen earns him the first Slam round of 16 of his career, on his first appearance in Paris.