US tennis player Danielle Collins reacted with humor to her early celebration of victory in the second round of the Australian Open.
"I'm not very good with the score, sometimes I forget it.
I think I have to work on that a bit," said Collins, who was seeded number 13, afterwards with a grin: "It was a bit embarrassing.
I would like to sink into the ground.”
In Wednesday's match against Czech Karolina Muchova, Collins already felt like the winner after winning the point to make it 7-3 in the tie-break of the third set.
She threw down her bat and threw her arms in the air.
"I thought the match was over"
As she made her way to the net to shake her opponent's hand, Collins noticed that she had stopped at the baseline.
At that moment she must have remembered that in Grand Slam tournaments in the decision set you don't need seven, but ten of your own points to win.
"I've never had a tie-break in the third set of a Grand Slam," explained the 29-year-old, "so I thought the match was over." Final score of 6:7 (1:7), 6:2, 7:6 (10:6) was allowed to celebrate.
The German player Laura Siegemund experienced a similar experience in Melbourne. She celebrated too early in her first round victory on Wednesday against the Italian Lucia Bronzetti with a score of 5: 3 in the third set.
"I was so focused with my service game, I didn't think about the score at all," explained the 34-year-old afterwards, "and when the ball went wide, I thought for a brief moment: The match is over."