MELBOURNE, Australia — A tennis player learned Wednesday not to celebrate a victory until the match was actually won.
Before Sebastian Ofner’s Australian Open qualifying defeat, the 29-year-old Austrian player walked to the net with his arms raised after leading 7-1 in the decisive decider against Nishesh Basavareddy.
The referee lets Ofner continue playing super tiebreakers until he scores at least 10 points (instead of 7) and leads by two.
Minutes later, as Basavareddy won 4-6, 6-4, 7-6 (11) – with Ofner having two match point chances – the 20-year-old American put his hands on his neck and made an apparent choking gesture at the net.
“I saw he was a little nervous,” Basavareddy said of Ofner’s reaction to the score loss, adding, “Generally when that happens, you start overthinking, like, ‘Oh, I thought I had won the game and moved on to the next round.'” So, yeah, that does give me a little bit of hope. “
Basavareddy will now face Britain’s George Lofhagen for a place in the first round of the main draw – the American defeated Novak Djokovic in the first round a year ago.
Ofner, ranked 131st, has never won the Australian Open main draw, although he reached the fourth round at the 2023 French Open.
