The Davis Cup rubber between Zizou Bergs of Belgium and Chile’s Cristian Garin ended with a swollen eye, disqualification pleas and an international incident on Sunday night.

In the third set of the match, Bergs broke Garin’s serve with a brilliant forehand pass to go up 6-5 and serve for the match. He sprinted to the net in celebration and leapt up into the air, just as his opponent was crossing over to return to his seat.

Bergs struck Garin in the face with his right shoulder, with the Chilean grasping at his right eye and collapsing to the ground.

Zizou Bergs makes a HUGE shot to break serve… but accidently collides with Cristian Garin in celebration :open_mouth: pic.twitter.com/6H2RqRmx4m

— Davis Cup (@DavisCup) February 2, 2025

In doing so, Bergs set off an extraordinary chain of events, featuring disputes between Garin and his own doctor, debate over tennis’ rules on disqualification and what Chile’s Olympic committee publicly called a “shameful international incident”. When the smoke cleared, Garin had been given a game penalty for refusing to return to the court, losing the final set 7-5 and the tie 3-1.

Here is the story of a strange evening in Hasselt, Belgium.

What happened?

The incident occurred with Belgium up 2-1 in the tie. After being knocked to the floor, Garin picked himself up but looked shocked and disorientated by what had happened. Bergs apologised instantly, before umpire Carlos Ramos gave him a code violation for unsportsmanlike conduct.

Chile were furious with what they perceived to be a lenient punishment, with Garin making this point forcefully as he received medical attention. After that attention was completed, Garin refused to resume the match. Ramos then issued him with three successive sanctions, all for not returning to the court in time. After a normal code violation and a point penalty, Ramos issued a game penalty, forcing Garin to lose the set and the match, and Chile the tie.

What do the Davis Cup rules say about defaults?

According to the Davis Cup’s regulations, “Team Members shall not at any time physically abuse any official, opponent, spectator or other person within the precincts of the site… For the purposes of this section, physical abuse is the unauthorised touching of an official, opponent, spectator or other person.”

Bergs’ leap into Garin certainly met that threshold, and per the regulations, “In circumstances that are flagrant and particularly injurious to the success of a tie, the Referee shall have the authority to declare a default for a single violation of this section.”

Garin certainly felt that this incident was “flagrant and particularly injurious to the success of a tie” and forcefully made the point that Bergs should have been disqualified. Had that request been granted then the tie would have been level at 2-2, with a final rubber to be played between Chile’s Nicolas Jarry (ranked No. 38) against the Belgian teenager Alexander Blockx (ranked more than 100 places lower at No. 151).

Why was Bergs not defaulted?

Umpire Ramos, who was in the chair for the controversial U.S. Open final between Serena Williams and Naomi Osaka in 2018, explained his decision not to default Bergs after the match. “I consider it was a very unfortunate accident between two players — caused unfortunately by a player without any intention,” Ramos said in a news conference.

“I don’t think anything that happened during that match would make anyone think it was not an accident.”

Ramos said that the independent tournament doctor cleared Garin to continue, which meant that he was committing a time violation by not returning to court in the allotted changeover time. The regulations, however, do not ascribe any outcome or impact of an action when considering whether or not a player should be defaulted, nor do they consider intent (whether or not an action is deliberate). Garin’s injury status should not, according to the rules, affect Ramos’ ruling on Bergs.

In numerous incidents recently, from Alex Michelsen hitting a ball into the crowd at last year’s Winston-Salem final in North Carolina to Terence Atmane doing the same at last year’s French Open, the outcome — in these cases, whether or not a spectator was hurt — has seemingly led to the players involved not being disqualified even though this is not how the rules are supposed to be enforced.

What was the fallout?

Chile’s fury at how things transpired continued after the match had finished.

Garin wrote on Instagram, “So the player is injured and can’t continue to play but we do like nothing happened.

“Wow what a beautiful world and what a great mentality (followed by three handclap emojis).”

He also showed his followers a photo of his right eye looking red and swollen, and wrote in a later post, “I still cannot believe we got disqualified … I have loved this sport for years and I’ve never thought I would experience something like this… Thanks to the ITF for ZERO WORRY FOR MY HEALTH.”

Cristian Garin’s eye is examined after the incident. (BENOIT DOPPAGNE/Belga/Sipa USA)

Garin was not technically disqualified. Had he received the game penalty at a time in the match when he was not one game from defeat, he would not have lost.

“They only wanted to finish that match at any cost,” Garin added in his post-match news conference, as he insisted he wasn’t physically able to continue playing. He claimed that he lost consciousness for three seconds, though Chile’s team doctor disputes this. Chile’s doctor still emphasized that Garin “was not in any condition to continue playing”, disagreeing with the assessment of the tournament’s own medical staff.

Chile’s team captain, Nicolas Massu, a former Olympic singles and doubles champion and coach of 2020 U.S. Open champion Dominic Thiem, added, “One hour and a half later we still didn’t receive any apology from anyone. Not a single person asked if Cristian is OK.”

A Tennis Belgium spokesperson told The Athletic that the Belgium captain, Steve Darcis, had subsequently been in touch with Massu, and that the organisation would be issuing a statement. Representatives for Bergs did not immediately respond when contacted by The Athletic for comment on Monday morning.

The International Tennis Federation (ITF), which runs the Davis Cup, issued a statement:

“This was a rare, unfortunate and very delicate situation and everyone involved, including the independent doctor, conducted due diligence based on rules and procedures.

“We understand the emotions attached to this unusual incident, but the final decision was made after consideration of all the facts and unique circumstances around it.”

Chile’s Olympic committee disagreed, and a statement shared by Garin on Instagram said it was “upset and incredulous” with the situation, and that it would support the Chilean tennis federation “so that this shameful international incident does not go unpunished”.

Will this have any wider ramifications for tennis?

Overall, this was a pretty strange incident. While there’s nothing wrong with celebrating exuberantly, there was an element of recklessness in Bergs’ actions and on another day he could easily have been defaulted. It would have been a desperately frustrating way to lose a match — and possibly a tie — in which he had worked so hard to gain an advantage.

For Garin, his anger was completely understandable and it’s hard to know exactly how much pain he was in, but he might regret now not putting aside his sense of injustice and indignation and trying to finish a match that only had a maximum of one game and a tiebreak left in it.

The defeat means that Chile misses the chance to take on Australia in September with a place in November’s Final 8 event at stake. Instead it will be Belgium which travels down under to face Lleyton Hewitt’s team.

More widely, the incident will open up the debate about what is or isn’t acceptable behaviour on a tennis court. Some supporters will have appreciated the passion in Bergs’ celebration, while others will feel this was a pretty clear breach of the rules and wasn’t appropriately punished. It also reintroduces conversations about inconsistency in the application of rules, particularly around defaults, which are supposed to be issued regardless of context and impact, even if that can lead to dissatisfying conclusions for both players and fans.

(Top photo: Benoit Doppagne / Belga via Sipa USA)