Women’s Final featured a singles match - Tort Assignment

A key event in the international tennis circuit is the annual Hastings Open. This year, the Women’s Final featured a singles match between Maria Spinoza of Argentina and the fiery American, Joan McElroy. The match began quietly however in the third and final set, tempers began to flare. After her third double fault, Maria hit a spare ball directly at Tina, a ball girl. It hit her on the shoulder and she burst into tears and ran from the court. A foot fault call from the referee, the bespectacled Colonel Withers, provoked Joan to shout at him, ‘I’ll kill you four eyes, you’re blind as a bat!’.  When she lost the final game and the match, Joan tossed her racket backwards over her shoulder into the crowd and it hit one of the spectators, Nigel, on the head. The cut he sustained required three stitches. In the corridor outside the players’ changing room after the match, Tina’s irate father Des was waiting for Maria.  He shook his fist at her and said ‘If you were a bloke, I’d smash your face in for what you have done to my girl!’  Maria, who is 6 ft. tall, grabbed his arm, twisted it and pushed him away. Joan was the last to leave the changing room. Suddenly the door burst open and in came Martin, one of her greatest fans. Martin had obtained a job from the Hastings Tournaments plc selling programmes in the hopes of meeting Joan. She was horrified when he insisted on kissing her hand. He then said, ‘Wait here while I get my autograph book.’ Martin ran out of the front door of the changing room, locking it from the outside, while he went to find the autograph book. Joan quickly left the changing room by its open back door and was escorted home. Questions: