ANDY MURRAY'S WIMBLEDON REPLACEMENT FAILS TO STEP UP WITH 'WORST CHOKE EVER'

David Goffin has had a rollercoaster few days in SW19, culminating in a defeat which he might need some time to recover from.

Belgian tennis star Goffin has twice reached the quarter-finals at Wimbledon, most recently in 2022, and at one point was ranked in the top 10 in the world. However, after dropping out of the top 100 last year, he was forced to go through qualifying this time around.

After coming through his first two qualifiers, he was pipped by Mattia Bellucci and missed out on a place in the main draw. Andy Murray's late withdrawal gave him another opening, though.

Tomas Machac was Goffin's opponent, and it looked for all the world as though the Belgian would take full advantage. That was, until he suffered a dramatic collapse to seize defeat from the jaws of victory.

Goffin led 6-3, 4-2 when play stopped for the night on Tuesday, and returned on Wednesday to go two sets up. Machac rallied back to force a fifth set decider, but when Goffin went 5-0 up in that set it looked to be done and dusted.

Machac had other ideas, though, somehow winning five games in a row. It went to a tie-break, and the Czech prevailed to set up a second round meeting with Roman Safiullin.

The response on social media was unflinching, with one fan writing: "This set has ended the career of David Goffin oh my god the worst choke I have ever seen".

"David Goffin is about to cap off the most insane choke job you will ever see in professional sports," a second said, with a third calling it "the biggest choke in tennis history".

Was David Goffin's collapse the worst choke in sporting history? Have your say in the comments section

"This match will forever stay in mind,” Machac told ATPtour.com after his victory. As if the manner of the victory wasn't enough, it was the first time Machac had won a singles match at Wimbledon after suffering a first round exit at the hands of Cam Norrie in 2023.

“I was still trying to play my game and I was believing that at least I could break him once, and let's see what was going to happen after," the 23-year-old added. "I had the chances to break him for the second time in a row and I took the chance and completely turned the match to my side.”

Second round opponent Safiullin also came from two sets down to progress, with Francisco Cerundulo on the wrong side of that result. Safiullin won 6-7, 3-6, 7-5, 6-3, 6-4 against the 26th seed to book his place in round two, and seventh seed Hubert Hurkacz could end up taking on the winner of the Safiullin-Machac battle in the third round.

2024-07-04T04:30:51Z dg43tfdfdgfd