"Very good at giving fines" - Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova calls out Wimbledon umpires after controversial line call against Sonay Kartal

Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova took a jibe at the umpires officiating at the Wimbledon Championships. Pavlyuchenkova was serving at 4-4 in the first set and was holding the game point when a backhand by Sonay Kartal landed beyond the baseline, but the electronic line calling failed. And instead of the point being awarded to Pavlyuchenkova, it was replayed, citing a system deactivation due to operator error.

Pavlyuchenkova held the world number 1 title as a junior when she was fourteen. She has made it to the quarter-finals of the four Grand Slams but is yet to win her first Major. The closest Pavlyuchenkova came to winning a singles title at a Major was at the 2021 French Open, where she fell to Barbora Krejčíková in the finals. The thirty-four-year-old tennis player represented Russia at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, where she won the Olympic gold medal in mixed doubles. The tennis star from Russia recently defeated the United Kingdom's Sonay Kartal, moving to the quarter-finals of the 2025 Wimbledon.

In her post-match presser, Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova was asked about the lack of initiative by the umpires, and she was very candid in terms of her response.

"I think we’re losing a little bit of this charm of actually having human being ball boys.. like, during Covid, we didn’t have ball boys. It becomes a bit weird and robot sort of oriented. They’re [umpires] very good at giving fines though and code violations. This, they don’t miss. Every time, any little thing, they’re just right there on it. I’d prefer they looked at the lines and calling the errors, mistakes better," said the Russian.

Pavlyuchenkova will be playing her second quarter-final at Wimbledon. The last Wimbledon quarter-final Pavlyuchenkova played was in 2016.

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Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova on beating Naomi Osaka at the 2025 Wimbledon

Internazionali BNL D'Italia 2025 - Day Three - Source: Getty

Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova is not fond of grass courts, but the Russian tennis player registered a victory against the Japanese tennis sensation Naomi Osaka. Pavlyuchenkova has moved into the Wimbledon quarterfinals after nine years, defeating Osaka 3-6, 6-4, 6-4 en route. The majority of the crowd was cheering for Osaka.

A majority of you were cheering for Naomi, but that’s ok. I’m mentally tough, so that didn’t bother me at all. The opposite: it gave me energy," said the Russian in her post-match interview.

Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova is also involved in designing the outfits she wears on the court. In the early season, the tennis player dazzled the court in a denim skirt at the Internazionali BNL d’Italia, following the denim footprint of legends like Andre Agassi and Serena Williams.