This morning, the Miami Open was greeted by a fun visitor as an iguana made its way onto centre court and interrupted an ongoing match between Tommy Haas and Jiri Vesely.
But it’s not the first time this has happened!
Here’s a look at 5 times non-human visitors made their way onto the court!
#5 Snaking around!
Snakes seem to be tennis fans – no matter the surface! At the clay court 2016 ATP Franken Challenger event in Furth, Germany, last year, it was business as usual, with a couple of players warming up for their Round 1 match.
Local player Julian Reister was up against Brazil’s Caio Zampieri, with the two players only warming up at the time. The two had just begun to hit when a spectator – not the players – spied the snake from the stands and yelled out to the organizers, shouting “Stop!” to the unsuspecting players on court.
With most volunteers too frightened to handle the creature, the task was left up to tournament organizer André Zietsman, who aproached the snake to remove it from the court. It was not an easy task for Zietsman, he said, clarifying he “... got closer but had the jitters, as there are a lot of venomous snakes in my home country in South Africa.”
Eventually, Zietsman and the groundskeeper at the court teamed up to remove the creature, and released it into a forest nearby.
#4 Black cats – bad luck?
Maybe not for Roberta Vinci! The Italian former top 10 player was playing at the WTA Qatar Open in 2016, with both Vinci and her rival, Çala Büyükakçay of Turkey, looking to book a spot in the quarter-finals.
With Vinci on the cusp of taking the first set at 6-5 and looking to break her rival’s serve, the two found a surprise visitor playing spoilsport to their match. A black cat, that had been sniffing around the stands, walked into the court area – and right next to the net. It remained there for a short while as ball boys attempted to chase it away – but the wily kitten sauntered through their legs before walking off – leaving an annoyed Roberta Vinci in its wake.
#3 Snakes on a Court
Florida is the land of reptiles with its climate, and lizards are a common sight here. But we bet these two tennis players did not anticipate the visitor who greeted them on court! At a 2016 ATP Challenger event in Sarasota, Florida, players Gonzalo Lama of Chile and Great Britain’s James Ward were locked in a first-round contest.
Lama, having overpowered Ward through the match, had raced to match point when players and organizers heard hissing noises as a snake made its way onto the hard courts.
Tournament volunnteers scrambled to take immediate action, but the snake had other plans. An organizer attempted to pick up the snake with his bare hands when the reptile responded by hissing and snapping back at him.
It eventually escaped back into the bushes around the court – but gave the players an experience – and the volunteer quite the scare!
#2 Iguana Takes Miami
If anyone may have thought the action at the 2017 Miami Masters was dulled by the absence of top seeds Andy Murray and Novak Djokovic, one of the many members of Florida’s reptile population decided to intervene.
A massive iguana was spotted running into the court area, and conveniently climbed the scoreboard in the midst of a match between German ace Tommy Haas and rival Jiri Vesely, and resisted any attempts by court officials to wrestle it away.
An official was seen throwing a towel over the creature to grab it by the tail – a dangerous task considering the tail whip is one of the iguana’s biggest weapons against predators. The creature crawled down the scoreboard, prompting Haas to quickly grab his cellphone and take a picture with the iguana, which then remained on the sidelines with the chair umpire calling for a resumption of play, while
As volunteers chased after the iguana, the reptile made a run for it, halting only for a moment in the middle of the court as spectators and onlookers cheered it on.
It was eventually shooed off the premises, but not before providing some comic relief – to players and fans alike!
#1 A cow on court in India
This one takes the cake. At a $15,000 women’s event organized by the Gwalior Chambal Tennis Association in the northern Indian city, a cow wandered onto the court midway through a match, and then crossed immediately onto the adjacent court, halting two matches at once.
With no care for the locals and officials who attempted to shoo it away, the cow sauntered at a relaxed pace until it was ready to leave.
Eventually, it headed off-court, where the owner presumably took it back to safety.
