'Are you kidding me?' - Holger Rune complains to umpire about Cameron Norrie's serving in shot clock row

Holger Rune was unhappy with Cameron Norrie, accusing the Brit of taking too long to serve during their third round match on Saturday.

Norrie progressed to the last 16 of the US Open for the first time in his career with a 7-5 6-4 6-1 win over the 19-year-old to set up a last 16 clash with Andrey Rublev.

But at 5-4 down in the second set, Rune was unhappy with the length of time it took Norrie to serve.

The 26-year-old had to catch the ball and repeat his service motion several times when the wind blew as he tossed it in the air, but he managed to stay within the 25-second shot clock time. However, Rune was not impressed.

"Are you kidding me?" the 19-year-old shouted to the umpire.

"Just before the time runs out, he serves, every time."

The umpire did not issue Norrie a warning, compelling Rune to add: "You really think he's not doing it on purpose?"

The world No. 9 did not appear to be bothered by Rune's protests and won the second set on his third set point.

Norrie said in his press conference afterwards that it was not his intention to waste time. He he felt it was "even better for" Rune to take his time to serve.

"No, I was not doing it on purpose," he said.

"I think it's even better for him. I'm struggling with a ball toss a couple of times, and I think - I didn't hear what he said - but I think it was the fact that if I throw the ball toss up, the ref was maybe stopping the clock, the time clock.

"I don't know. I think it can be annoying to return, but wasn't too bad. It was a couple times, and I would say even better for him. I was not doing it on purpose."

When Norrie was asked if he noticed Rune complaining about his serving, he replied: "I think it was just the once. He said something once, and it was no more, so I wasn't too worried.

"It was a couple times I did it. But, yeah, no biggie."

Norrie, now ranked ninth in the world, has never advanced further than the third round at the US Open but it is clear to see that he has taken a lot of confidence from his deep run at Wimbledon where he reached the semi-final.

"It was a big goal of mine to play well at slams and play deep in slams, and to have these match-ups," continued Norrie.

"I think it does help, you know, going into the tournament, being ranked where I am, being seeded where I am. Obviously Wimbledon, didn't get the points there, so maybe I could have been a higher seed anyway.

"But, no, I think it's great, you know. Coming into these matches, I don't think I played great against my first couple rounds. I was able to feel a lot more relaxed today and kind of use that momentum from those matches to get through those tough ones where I didn't really play great to playing a lot better today.

"Yeah, I think it's great with the seeding. You can work your way more into the tournament than going out there, having to play a top seed early on.

"So it was a good match today, and I was happier with how I performed. I still got a lot of things I would like to improve, and I got tomorrow to do that."

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