Terence Atmane completely lost his temper during the Shanghai Masters qualifiers. The spectators screamed.
Terence Atmane caused a stir with a nasty outburst during the ATP Masters qualifiers in Shanghai. With the score at 2–2 in the decisive third set against Bernard Tomic, the Frenchman, after a backhand error, hurled his racket with great force across the entire court towards the stands.
The spectators flinched and screamed, but nobody was hit. However, this was only because the fence in front of the fans prevented something even worse from happening. The racket bounced off and flew back onto the court.
Before Medvedev’s incident, Terence Atmane flung his racket towards the crowd during the Shanghai qualifiers and, by a miracle, didn’t crack anyone’s head open.
As he didn’t hit anyone, he wasn’t disqualified. https://t.co/QgCzLswi1L
— Ariel Fernández (@AFD7L) 5 October 2026
Atmane is not disqualified
He was not disqualified because Atmane did not hit any spectators. The Frenchman did not even apologise to the fans and did not give them a second glance. Instead, he picked up his racket and used it to knock his towel away. Shortly afterwards, Tomic was leading 5–3 and was on the verge of winning the match. Then Atmane simply gave up.
Just last week, the 24-year-old had also given up immediately before the end of his match against the Swede Elias Ymer, with the score at 5–5 in the third set, when he was on the verge of defeat at the tournament in Jingshan.
Atmane is currently ranked 99th in the world; in April, he was still in 41st place. The left-hander had already made negative headlines at the US Open. When the physiotherapist refused to treat his cramps – thereby following the rules – Atmane also lost his temper. As a result, the offender had to pay a fine of 7,500 US dollars. He is now likely to face another fine.
