Andy Roddick reveals ‘awkward’ Jack Draper encounter amid ‘cheat’ accusations

Jack Draper has admitted the prospect of being labelled a ‘cheat’ has been hard to deal with, as he found himself embroiled in one of the most contentious points of 2024.

The young Brit was involved in a controversial match point against Felix Auger-Aliassime at the Cincinnati Master earlier this month when he appeared to hit the ball into the ground at the net before it looped over, with umpire Greg Allensworth awarding the point to the Briton.

A host of players past and present waded into the debate on social media, with former US Open champion Andy Roddick suggesting Draper would definitely have known it was a foul shot and Stefanos Tsitsipas posting a slow-motion replay of the incident with the caption “Oh my!”, while Novak Djokovic said it was “embarrassing” not to have video replays available.

“I think it’s hard to stay away from it,” he said. “I’ve always valued myself on being honest and a good person.

“Forget the tennis – that is one of the most important things to me in my life. So to obviously see that stuff, and see people talking about you for the first time in a negative way – and questioning your integrity and stuff like that – it’s obviously difficult to see.

“I don’t blame people for doing that. Obviously, on the slow mo, when you watch it from the side, it’s very clear it’s an illegal shot. There’s no doubt about that.

“But obviously, when you’re in the moment and you serve out wide and the guy’s hit a 95mph ball at your feet, you just put a racket down and I didn’t know what happened.

“I was thinking about it four days non-stop. I was really upset by it.

“I think anyone would be lying if they’re saying they’re not hurt by seeing a lot of comments saying, ‘you’re a cheat’, ‘you’re a liar’. And, ‘I would have done this’ and, ‘I would have done that’.

“It’s hard in that situation to know what to do and also it’s good because it’s my first experience of sort of having negativity and having criticism and that’s all part of being a top athlete.

“People questioned my integrity, which is fine, but I was definitely hurt by it.”

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Meanwhile, former US Open champion Andy Roddick has revealed he had what he described as an ‘awkward’ encounter with Draper at the US Open.

Roddick went on record to state his belief that Draper knew he had played an illegal shot against Auger-Aliassime, as he suggested any player would have appreciated they were in the wrong.

“It was a huge story, but I’m not mad at anyone,” said former world No 1 Roddick on the latest episode of his Served with Andy Roddick podcast.

“I’m mad at the rule. The lack of common sense from the rules committee.

“Guess who I walked into in the locker room this morning… Jack Draper. After I had said he had buried a shank right into the ground all week.

“And he couldn’t have been nicer. I thought he was definitely not a listener (to Roddick’s podcast)!

“He didn’t cheat. That was not his call to make. That’s not his job, he has enough to do.

“I genuinely like Jack Draper. I am a fan of his game. He can do a lot to bother a lot of people with that big leftie serve.

“Jack Draper is tall man. I walked past him today. He is tall, an imposing figure.”