Gaël Monfils gets up to some serious mischief with the tournament director at the Ultimate Tennis Showdown. A disqualification of the French tennis star is inevitable
Turmoil surrounding Gaël Monfils! The French tennis star has been disqualified from the Ultimate Tennis Showdown (UTS) in Oslo after a curious incident.
According to the organizers, there was a “playful exchange of blows” between Monfils and Stéphane Apostolou in the changing room, in which the tournament director was slightly injured.
The official homepage of the UTS went on to say: “The UTS is 100% convinced that Gaël had no malicious intent, but as an official was injured, even if only slightly, we saw no other option than to disqualify Gaël. “
Consequence: Monfils had “accepted the disqualification. He and the tournament director part on amicable terms. “
Monfils: Fooling around with the tournament director
“I never intended to hurt anyone or cause any harm, and luckily Stephane knows that,” Monfils wrote on X, adding that it was “an accident and nothing more”. Monfils, ranked number 70 in the world, was replaced by his compatriot Lucas Pouille
I want to tell everyone what happened at UTS in Oslo. As per the release from UTS directly, there was no malice or negativity on my part. No abuse, no violence.
However, whilst joking around in the locker room, Stephane was unfortunately hurt. It was never my intention to hurt…
– Gael Monfils (@Gael_Monfils) February 10, 2024
Monfils had already played a match at the Ultimate Tennis Showdown with other top players such as Holger Rune, Aleksander Bublik, Casper Ruud, Dominic Thiem, Andrey Rublev and Benoît Pair, who were recently coached by Boris Becker, but lost out to Australian Alex de Minaur.
