David Nalbandian faces police probe after outburst injures judge

Police are investigating a complaint of assault after a line judge was injured when tennis player David Nalbandian kicked an advertising hoarding into him.

Scotland Yard said a complaint had been made following the incident at the Aegon Championships on Sunday.

A spokesman said: “We are aware of an incident at the Aegon Championships on June 17.

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“A complaint has been made and the Metropolitan Police Service is now investigating.

“The allegation is of assault.”

Nalbandian was also fined the maximum penalty of 10,000 euros (£6,400) for the incident, the ATP confirmed.

Line judge Andrew McDougall was left with a bloodied shin following the outburst during Sunday’s final at the Queen’s Club in west London.

Nalbandian won the first set of the final but lost his temper in the second after being broken by Croatian opponent Marin Cilic.

After missing a lunging forehand, Nalbandian kicked an advertising hoarding in front of the chair of line judge Mr McDougall. The hoarding flew off its hinges and struck Mr McDougall in the shin, causing an inch-long gash that began seeping blood.

Nalbandian was disqualified after being deemed guilty of unsportsmanlike conduct and suffered further pain when he had his £36,500 prize money withdrawn.

Despite the incident, Nalbandian said afterwards that he hoped to return to the Wimbledon warm-up event next year.

“This incident doesn’t mean that I’m not going to come back,” said the Argentinian.

“It doesn’t matter. I really feel good at this tournament.

“The tournament director is great to me and I like it.

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“This is a bad situation for everybody and I really apologise for that but it doesn’t mean anything to next year.”

The 6,000-strong crowd sided with Nalbandian immediately after the incident, many of them unaware that the kick had caused such damage to the left leg of Mr McDougall, who needed treatment for the injury.

Tournament director Chris Kermode stopped short of saying Nalbandian, the tenth seed, would be allowed back, but conceded that banning the player would be highly unlikely.

“Look, mistakes happen,” he said. “I haven’t really thought about next year, but you can ask me again in a couple of weeks.

“There was no way he intended to do that. It would be foolish to say he’s not welcome back to this tournament.

“The tennis he’s played this week has been phenomenal and the crowd like him.

“You could tell by the crowd that they wanted him to play, so you have to forgive these things and move on.”

Tennis star John McEnroe, famous for his own on-court tantrums, has advised players to channel their anger into the game. The former world No 1, 53, famous for his “You cannot be serious” rant, was labelled Superbrat for his explosions of temper.

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He told the Radio Times: “Anger should be fairly straightforward. If you use that anger in a positive way, where you get yourself to try harder and dig deeper, it can be a good thing.”

Mr McEnroe made the comments before the Nalbandian incident. Mr McEnroe said of his own outbursts: “It was not as controlled as I would have liked. Initially especially, the intensity and the energy that I let out in certain ways helped my tennis.”

He added: “The fact that perhaps I thought I could get away with certain things doesn’t mean that I did things on purpose. It just means that I was less afraid that I would get penalised if I did do something.”

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