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Sexism storm over Wimbledon's 'unacceptable' move

Kevin Anderson’s marathon victory and the bizarre stoppage of Rafa Nadal’s semi-final with Novak Djokovic, have led to a scheduling change that is sparking outrage.

A record-breaking day at Wimbledon ended with the second men’s semi-final between Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic falling foul of the 11pm curfew.

After the epic six hours and 36 minutes semi-final encounter between Kevin Anderson and John Isner, top seed Nadal did not hit the first serve of his match against 12th-seeded Djokovic until 8.09pm.

That gave two players who have contested some of the most gruelling matches in tennis history less than three hours or the prospect of completing the match on Saturday.

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Does Serena Williams deserve more respect? Pic: Getty
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In the end, and to the surprise of no one, they did not come close to finishing after two hours and 54 minutes of play on Friday night.

The match will get back under way at 1pm, tournament organisers said, and it will be played under the roof again, given it began in those conditions.

That is likely to delay the start of women’s final between Serena Williams and Angelique Kerber, which is scheduled to commence at 2pm.

News of the women’s final being moved to accomodate for the men’s semi-final was greeted with shock and anger by many, who argued tournament organisers could instead make the men wait to play until after the women had their match.

WTA insider Courtney Nguyen was especially furious about the the situation.

However, many tennis fans on Twitter agreed with tournament organisers, saying the men’s match had to get finished so the winner could be physically ready for their final with Anderson.

Only seven of the previous 51 meetings between Nadal and Djokovic had been won by the player who lost the opening set, so it was a major boost to the Serb’s hopes when he took the opener.

But world No.1 broke twice in the second set and fended off more break points to level the match.