‘Turn the machine off!’: Doubles pair halt Wimbledon match after controversial Hawkeye call

The match resumed despite threats from Joe Salisbury and Rajeev Ram to stop playing

Rajeev Ram and Joe Salisbury are the top seeds in the men’s doubles (Getty Images)

The top ranked men’s doubles pair at Wimbledon, Joe Salisbury and Rajeev Ram, caused controversy during their quarter-final match on Wednesday after calling a halt to their match and demanding for the hawkeye machine to be turned off over a disputed line call.

Salisbury and Ram, the No 1 men’s doubles team in the world, believed they had taken the crucial break at 5-5 in the second set but a challenge from the French pair of Nicolas Mahut and Edouard Roger-Vasselin determined that their ball had caught the back of the baseline.

It triggered a furious reaction from the Briton Salisbury and his American playing partner Ram, who claimed the technology was at fault and protested to the chair umpire Fergus Murphy.

"They’ve got to turn it off because it’s wrong,” Salisbury demanded, while Ram claimed: “There’s no way, no way at all. We’re turning the machine off. We’re not in the future here man.”

Salisbury called on the supervisor to be brought out on Court No 2 but umpire Murphy refused their demands to switch off the technology.

Despite their threats, Ram and Salisbury continued with the match but it was Mahut and Roger-Vasselin who took the second set on a tiebreak.

Salisbury and Ram then comfortably won the third set to reestablish their lead. The supervisor did come out onto court, however, and informed the furious pair that the contested point had indeed caught the line