Alex de Minaur wants one ball toss only at the serve

Shanghai, Sunday night. Alex de Minaur had just gone past Rei Sakamoto in the third round of the Masters 1000, and he talked rules more than tennis. The world No 9 wants a server to be allowed one ball toss, and no more.

“I would only allow one ball toss,” he said in his press conference. “Once you have tossed the ball, you have to serve whatever happens. If you decide not to, it’s a fault.” He is after a habit every returner knows: the toss let go at the moment of contact, followed by a routine started from scratch. “It’s a kind of trick players sometimes take advantage of: when they are about to serve and they miss their toss, they can start their whole routine again.”

The hole in the 25-second rule

The current rule gives the server 25 seconds before the first serve, with the clock starting once the chair umpire has called the point. Between first and second serve, no time is counted. A server who lets his toss go can breathe, reset his routine, and send a returner who had just found his timing back to zero. De Minaur also backs a set delay between first and second serve: two sides of the same time gain.

“He’s 1000% right”

Brad Gilbert, the former coach of Agassi, Roddick, Murray and Gauff, cheered him on X: “He’s 1000% right, I’ve been saying for 40 years that it’s ridiculous you can get as many redos on ball toss as you want.”

No reform is on the table at the ATP or the ITF: this is one player’s view, not a calendar. A player who knows his subject: de Minaur returned to competition in Shanghai five days after retiring from the Beijing final against Djokovic, and his round-of-16 match against Karen Khachanov comes on Wednesday. As the rule stands, a missed toss still costs nothing.