Tennis star Alexander Zverev calls out automated line judging system
It’s clay court season in tennis, and instead of questioning the judgments of chair umpires, some players are now questioning the decisions of complex software — specifically electronic line-calling (ELS) systems, which are increasingly tasked with determining whether a ball is in or out. German tennis star Alexander Zverev became the latest to dispute the technology after it called his opponent’s ball “in” during a Madrid Open match against Alejandro Davidovich Fokina, as reported earlier by The Athletic. Zverev pointed to the discrepancy between the ELS call and the ball’s mark, which appeared just outside the court’s white line. Whereas on hard and grass courts, the other surfaces tennis players compete on, clay is unique because it is composed of loose particles of brick and stone. It also means that when a ball strikes a clay court, it leaves a mark of where it bounced. This is often used as clear and indisputable evidence of whether a ball was in or out. So what happens when the automated line-calling software disagrees with the visible mark …
