Severity of Bernard Tomic’s tank job highlighted by one jarring moment

Bernard Tomic’s tennis career has become a laughing stock and one incident exposes the full extent of the Aussie’s insulting fall from grace.

Bernard Tomic has hit some pretty low troughs in his tennis career and it’s hard to find a defence for him after a particularly grim moment during his most recent loss.

The Aussie star, once ranked 17th in the world but now 197th, lost to Ernests Gulbis in just 53 minutes during qualifying for the Delray Beach Open on Monday (AEDT).

Depressingly, Tomic won just three points in the second set of his 6-2 6-0 drubbing and amongst the horror show was one moment that exposed just how disinterested he’s really become.

Gulbis was already up 2-0 in the second set when he had three break points on Tomic’s serve before a forehand slice drop shot was called out. It was a slightly delayed “out” call and Tomic had already made ground and dinked a backhand slice over the net which landed in.

Gulbis didn’t attempt to retrieve Tomic’s ball, instead arguing with the umpire his shot was actually in — and the official agreed.

Had the shot in question been a winner, Gulbis would have won the game. But because Tomic returned it, the point should have been replayed.

However, rather than force Gulbis to return another serve and earn his break, Tomic just let him have the point.

The umpire called game for Gulbis, giving him a 3-0 lead, while Tomic didn’t even bother to replay the point, instead appearing to suggest to the umpire he was happy to let his opponent take the 3-0 advantage.

If, perhaps, there was a misunderstanding and the umpire accidentally awarded the game to Gulbis, forgetting the point actually needed to be replayed, Tomic could have set him straight.

But he didn’t.

Instead, the 27-year-old just wandered back to his seat for the change of ends, not caring at all Gulbis had won a point when he didn’t deserve to.

If he was unaware of the rules, it highlights an absence of professionalism or concentration — whichever you prefer.

CHECK OUT THE INCIDENT IN THE VIDEO PLAYER ABOVE

Tomic’s career has been on a downward spiral for a while.

Remarkably, despite his humiliating defeat, Tomic will still be one of four Australians in the main draw at Delray Beach after being drawn as the lucky loser to replace Tennys Sandgren, who withdrew due to knee pain.

The Queenslander will face Cedrik-Marcel Stebe in the first round on Wednesday at 3am AEDT with the winner taking on either second-seeded Canadian Milos Raonic or Italian veteran Andreas Seppi — the beaten finalist at the New York Open on Sunday.

Tomic’s quickfire loss to Gulbis is still the second longest of his past five matches. He endured the second-fastest defeat of his career last week in New York, falling to Japan’s Go Soeda 6-2 6-1 in just 39 minutes. He also lost to world No. 306 Brandon Nakashima in just 44 minutes in Dallas earlier this month.

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The shortest match of Tomic’s career is his 28-minute effort in losing 6-0 6-1 to Jarkko Nieminen in 2014.

Once considered one of Australia’s brightest talents, Tomic has previously said he doesn’t care about tennis and is more concerned with money. After bombing out in qualifying at the 2018 Australian Open he said he was going home to “count my millions”, while after losing in Madrid in 2017 he said: “Would you care if you were 23 and worth over $10 million?”

Tomic was slapped with an $81,000 fine after capitulating 6-2 6-1 6-4 in just 58 minutes against Jo Wilfried-Tsonga in his opening round match at Wimbledon last year — the second shortest men’s singles match at the All England Club since records began in 2002.

With AAP