Even in the tempestuous career of Goran Ivanisevic, being forced to withdraw from a tournament because he had smashed all his rackets is a first.

But that is exactly what happened to the big-serving Croat, who was forced to withdraw from his second-round match at the Samsung Open in Brighton for that very reason.

Both tournament supervisor Gerry Armstrong and referee Alan Mills confirmed this was the first time this had ever happened at a senior ATP event.

Ivanisevic clearly showed little foresight when he went on court for his match against Korea's Hyung-Taik Lee with only three of his favourite Head Prestige Classic 600 rackets.





The first went at the vital stage of the first set, when the Croat dropped serve to give Lee a 6-5 lead. He smashed it on the court and hit furiously hit a ball into the crowd. He was given a code violation for equipment abuse as he walked back to his seat for the changeover and dumped the racket in a handily-placed wastebin. Lee went on to hold serve and take the first set 7-5 but a seemingly-calm Ivanisevic pulled himself together to level at one set all after winning the tie-break 7-5. But his temper got the better of him at the start of the third set and after missing break points at 1-1 he gave another a thrashing on the ground.



I announced to the spectators that he could not carry on because of lack of appropriate equipment

Tournament supervisor Gerry Armstrong