Wimbledon controversy triggers BBC pundit to launch angry rant - 'Absolutely ridiculous'

BBC pundit Pat Cash erupted into a bemused rant about Wimbledon's electronic line calling controversy as he summarised the day's action with Clare Balding on Sunday evening. Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova was on the wrong end of a significant mistake during the first set of her victory against Britain's Sonay Kartal on Centre Court.

Pavlyuchenkova was serving with advantage at 4-4 when Kartal fired a forehand long, clearly landing beyond the baseline. However, the electronic line calling system, which has replaced line judges at Wimbledon for the first time this year, failed to call it "out" because it was not working.

After an emergency call to the tournament supervisor, chair umpire Nico Helwerth announced that the pair were to replay the point, which Kartal then won before breaking Pavlyuchenkova's serve.

The farcical moment left the Russian player in tears as she complained to Helwerth, implying that Kartal had got special treatment because she was British.

Cash, sitting on the BBC's panel on Sunday night, was just as outraged as Pavlyuchenkova, who recovered to win 7-6 (7-3) 6-4 to end the British interest in the women's singles draw.

He told Balding: "Absolutely ridiculous. That call was clearly out. It was game point. It was a huge point in the match of these players' careers.

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"The chair umpire is there for that reason. It was clearly out. How couldn't he call that out and say, 'Game, we'll sort it out at the change of ends'?

"Mindboggling that he couldn't call that out. He doesn't have to do much at all, but for that, it was four inches out.

"He stopped and said, 'Ok, it was out, but the machine didn't say it was out, so let's just replay the point because the line machine didn't say it.'"

The Australian continued his rant by awkwardly referencing the British TV show Little Britain: "I mean... computer says no! You know where that's from."

After Balding confirmed she was aware of the quote used by David Walliams' character Carol Beer, Cash added: "It was so far out! It was game point, it was to go 5-4.

"This is a huge point, it was not like it's the first point of the match. And it was right in front of his face. What else does he have to do? Not an awful lot. Call that one.

"I think what Pavlyuchenkova is saying we need to have an emergency thing where if that happens, there's somebody calling in the umpire's ear going 'That was out, that was in, call it out.' That makes sense.

"I think at this stage we don't have that, so if everything goes down, what happens? The whole tournament stops? I am sure the club will be thinking about this for next year.

"These tournaments and Grand Slams get together and go 'Ok, there was a minor failure, not like the whole system went down'.

"And they'll come up with an emergency solution for that, I'm sure. And get rid of the chair umpire altogether! (laughs)"