Clay Court Line Calling

On the first point of the third game in the Madrid quarterfinal, Djokovic served an ace down the T.  The ball landed very close to the center line, so the umpire started down from his chair to confirm that the ball was in by looking at the mark.  Indicating that he had checked the mark himself and confirmed that the “in” call was correct, Milos Raonic stopped the umpire and play resumed with the score 15-0.  Raonic got some applause from the fans for showing honesty in accepting the ace call and preempting the umpire’s visit.  

HOWEVER, the television network covering the match was using the Hawkeye electronic line calling system, and they subsequently showed the viewers at home that both Raonic and the linesman were INCORRECT - the ball was out by a substantially greater margin than the margin of error for Hawkeye, which is estimated at 3.6 mm.  Things might have gone differently in that set if Djokovic had been required to hit a second serve and lost that point, because he lost the next point.  So Djokovic might have fallen behind by 30-0 instead of being at 15-15.   Although it is highly unlikely that the correct call would have changed the outcome of this match, the discrepancy between Hawkeye and the naked eye for clay court line calling was manifest. 

I have seen similar things happen in several other clay court matches, and one must assume that the problem occurs far more frequently than is presently observed.  After all, clay court matches are rarely covered by networks that have their own Hawkeye system and use it to check every close call. 

It should not be surprising that a ball traveling at close to 100 mph with 2-3000 rpm of spin would kick up quite a lot of clay when it landed and make a mark that did not perfectly represent the dimensions of the contact area between the ball and the court surface.   Eyeballing the mark is certainly better than nothing, but it is clearly inferior to Hawkeye.T

To install Hawkeye on courts Philippe Chatrier and court Suzanne Lenglen, where the most important French Open matches take place, would certainly break a tradition, and would cost some money as well.  However, consider the money issue as follows:  I costs about $60,000.00 to install Hawkeye on a court, and the total French Open prize money this year will be $36 million.  The prize money is about 300 times as much as the installation cost.  In addition, consider the money that’s at stake for players who reach the late rounds.  Winning a French Open final could easily be worth millions to a player.  As for the tradition, maybe Raonic could comment on that after he reviews the video of his loss to Djokovic in Madrid!