Lleyton Hewitt and Guillermo Coria will be fined for insults during their Davis Cup clash last week — the Australian for calling the umpire a ”poof” and the Argentinian for spitting, Tennis Australia said on Wednesday.
The International Tennis Federation had informed Tennis Australia it would determine the fines at its next meeting, a spokesperson said.
Hewitt, who is due to marry his pregnant girlfriend, soapie actress Bec Cartwright, in Sydney on Thursday, has already apologised for his remark during the bad-tempered singles match on Friday.
”I regret having said what I said in the heat of the match,” the Australian number one was quoted as telling Sydney’s Daily Telegraph.
”I apologise for any offence I may have caused to any individual or groups.”
Coria, who ultimately lost the match 7-6 (7/5), 6-1, 1-6, 6-2, will be fined for spitting at a referee. He said after the match that he felt like killing Hewitt during the game.
”As a person outside the game it’s one thing, but on the court I really felt like killing him,” Coria said through an interpreter at his post-match press conference.
”He can be the best player in the world, he can win every tournament but he cannot behave the way he does, abusing the captain, abusing the other players, abusing everyone. I won’t repeat what I heard out there.”
Hewitt, who has been criticised for cheering his opponent’s mistakes, denied abusing the Argentinian when speaking to reporters after the match.
Argentina eventually won the Davis Cup round 4-1.
World number two Hewitt is due to marry 21-year-old Cartwright at a ceremony at the Sydney Opera House on Thursday.
According to a report in The Daily Telegraph, the young couple will have 180 guests at their nuptials and Hewitt’s coach Roger Rasheed will be groomsman.
Hewitt proposed to Cartwright in late January, the night he lost the final of the Australian Open to Russian Marat Safin. – Sapa-AFP