Alex de Minaur stopped playing to approach a spectator in the middle of his opening match at the Italian Open. The No. 7 seed is usually mild-mannered on the court, but he wasn't happy when a member of the crowd disrespected him while he was attempting to serve at 4-4 in the second set.

De Minaur was deep in the heat of battle against Italian wildcard Luca Nardi when he was thrown off by the disturbance and marched to the back of the court, asking fans in the front row to own up to their actions. The umpire, Nico Helwerth, immediately intervened, calling for security before getting off his chair and handling matters himself.

It had been a long night for De Minaur and Nardi on the Grand Stand Arena at the Foro Italico. They took to the court around 9pm local time and, after taking the first set 6-4, De Minaur found himself pulled into a huge fight in set two.

The Aussie blew his first nine break points of the set before he finally got his reward, breaking to lead 4-3. But Nardi broke straight back and the pressure was back with the seventh seed.

As De Minaur served at 4-4 15-0, attempting to put himself back in front, he suddenly stopped his service motion and went to the back of the court, grabbing his towel while staring at someone.

“Can you please stop that, sir?” the umpire said from his chair, before radioing another official. “Roland, can we send security up to the guy please?”

Commentators were confused as they couldn’t make out what had happened. But it was clear De Minaur wasn’t okay with it.

“No idea what was said but De Minaur is not continuing until the man or woman in question is no longer watching,” Adam Fielder said.

The 26-year-old walked up to the row of spectators in the front row behind the baseline, asking: “So who was it? Who was it? Who went like that?”

Helwerth raced over to join him and had a stern warning for the fan in question. “I’ve seen you that you’ve done it. You listen to me, if you do it one more time, you will leave the stadium. Is that clear?” he stated before returning to the chair, allowing play to resume.

De Minaur used the issue to fuel himself, closing out the game to love. He broke Nardi in the final game of the match to deal a 6-4 7-5 victory shortly before 11 p.m. The second set alone took 74 minutes.

Afterwards, the seventh seed said: “I did what I needed to do today. It wasn’t easy by any means, it was a tough match. The tennis, I don’t think was great from both sides, but sometimes you’ve got to play with the cards you’re dealth and that was today.

“I did my best to stay focused and stay as strong as I could mentally, that was what helped me out today.

“To be honest, I think throughout the whole match, I had a lot of chances that I didn’t take. I think I did well to not lose my head! Because it would’ve been quite easy to get frustrated after having so many chances to break and not being able to get it over the line.”