Lulu Sun falls just short after bizarre stoppage at Wimbledon qualifying

Lulu Sun’s Wimbledon qualifying match was bizarrely halted for more than an hour on set point during her 7-6(10) 7-6(5) loss to France’s Oceane Dodin, due to an electronic line-calling malfunction.

Sun was attempting to emulate her remarkable run from two years ago, when she came through qualifying and reached the Wimbledon quarterfinals. She had begun this year’s campaign impressively with a first-round win over Linda Klimovicova.

Breaks for rain aren’t uncommon in England, but on Wednesday play was halted across the entire venue for an electronic line calling issue. Wimbledon, like most tournaments, has replaced human line judges with cameras and computers and when the system needed rebooting, no play could take place.

Neither Sun nor Dodin were able to get a break of serve in the opening set, and with Sun about to serve at 6-7 in the tiebreak, the umpire hastily stopped play.

Both players sat in their chairs for five minutes, then Sun went over to her team with a towel on her head, to give herself the smallest relief from the sun.

After 15 minutes the players were sent to the locker room and that’s where they remained for the next hour.

Once back on court, Sun’s first job was to save the set point against her, which she did with a kick-serve out wide.

“Having breaks like that, whether it's for rain or electronic line calls, the momentum shifts,” Sun said. 

“In that sense it was good for me because she had the momentum. I could have lost that point, and it would have been the set, so I was just trying to do my best to get that point specifically.”

But at 10-11 in the tiebreak, Sun framed a forehand to hand Dodin the opening set.

Sun’s serve was broken in the opening game of the next set and she lost the following game in no time. 

“It's tough to not get the set after you're getting some opportunities,” Sun said.

“Then, I started serving first [in the second set], so it's tricky, you have to get right back, and I didn't do that.”

It looked like the end of this match could come quickly, but Sun was able to regain her composure. 

Getting that break back looked elusive for Sun though as Dodin went up 5-4 40-15 for two match points. 

Strangely, Dodin seemed to have some trouble with her service action at that point and Sun played as if she had nothing to lose.

“Really, what I tried to do at the end was just do whatever I could,” Sun said.

“At that point I wasn't really returning much and wasn't giving her difficulties, so I tried to change something up just to give myself a chance.”

Sun broke and took the match into a second tiebreaker, which once again came down to just one point, this time Sun going long with a backhand from the baseline on match point.

Sun says she may next play in Europe before heading across the Atlantic for the start of the US swing, but she does feel like her game is going in the right direction.

She’s always been a player that needs plenty of matches to get into her best form and going agonisingly close to beating a player of Dodin’s quality backs that theory up. In this match Sun an impressive 23 aces and double faulted just twice.

“In qualifying, it's not like there hasn't been top 100 people here, or up and coming juniors, or people who have been injured and lost ranking because of that,” Sun said. 

“People think there's a major difference in level between qualifying and the main event, but it's really not, and that's why you see so many qualifiers doing well in the main draw.”