It is Open season on Craig Tilley. Don't know him? He's the bloke being blamed for Lleyton Hewitt's Melbourne Park exit.

He'll be hung, drawn and quartered in Garden Square later today.

There have been calls for the South African-born tournament director to resign ? and if not, be sacked - after he made Lleyton Hewitt and Marcos Baghdatis play their now infamous marathon five-set, 4 hour 45 minute match in graveyard hours.

Tilley is unrepentant. He says the right decision wade made.

First things first. Tilley can't be held account for Lleyton's straight-sets fourth-round exit to world number three Novak Djokovic, who has been the best player outside Roger Federer in the past six months.

Lleyton knows that. In a rare act of diplomacy, our top-ranked male chose not to return serve on Tilley or his team in his post-match media conference.

He bowed out gracefully. Instead, the calls for blood have come from tennis writers and commentators who have claimed Tilley's supposed scheduling "cock-up" compromised the potential for Lleyton to climb further through the draw.

The Australian's eminent mouthpiece Patrick Smith led the charge, calling for everything bar the native springbok's deportation.

The fact that Tilley had the authority and power to amend schedules is not for debate. He chose status quo ? and correctly.

Had Tilley have used that power, the Open would have been overwhelmed with worldwide headlines of another ilk. Sexism claims, from reigning Wimbledon champion in Venus Willams.

Tilley was in a no-win situation and either way, he was always going to be painted a villain. He also had an obligation to his worldwide audience, through multi-million dollar broadcast deals, to showcase the female curtain-raiser in both players' homelands - the United States and Israel.

He had a similar commitment to thousands of fans that had paid a premium to see them play.

Of course, we'll never know what Lleyton might have done has he been adequately rested ? and not sleep deprived, tired or simply beat.

But we do know Lleyton is a fit, professional athlete and he, more than most, knows that matches, sometimes, go for a long-time.

That's tennis. And had Tilley have delayed Lleyton's match until sometime on Sunday, the victor would have had even less recovery time.

In the calls for Tilley's scalp, it's important we not lose sight of his achievements. Tilley is one of the world's most qualified tennis aficionados; a former captain of South Africa's Davis Cup team, a director of tennis at the University of Illinois and a two-time US National Coach of the Year. We're lucky to have his CV.

The Illinois program he mentored produced more ATP Tour players in five years than any other of its kind. Tilley led the Illinois men's team from a disastrous 4-23 win-loss record in the year he took over to winning the NCAA title in 2003 with an undefeated season, setting a new record of 64 consecutive match victories.

His talent identification program that he has pioneered here has brought more future Hewitt's, Rafter's and Cash's to the sport.

There are more junior tournaments - and more prize money. The centerpiece of the program, a high performance academy, where the best juniors can train together has produced the likes of Casey Dellacqua, Brydon Kline, Jessica Moore and Bernard Tomic. Dellacqua, who joined the program inside the past twelve months, was gifted former Davis Cup player Sandon Stolle as her coach.

Since, she has progressed past the first round for the first time in five years. Her most significant scalp was no easy-beat, Amelie Mauresmo.

Seventeen-year-old Jessica Moore tested her game against the world's top ranked players ? and won. She has since been added to Australia's Fed Cup team for this month's round-robin tournament in Thailand.

Tilley also made the courageous decision to snub a sometime Australian, sometime Serbian, Jelena Dokic and force an overweight former world number four to qualify.

Likewise, he opted against Mark Philippoussis, encouraging him to chance his luck in the play-off. Instead he delivered wildcards to the future of our sport.

Alun Jones, who won his first round, joined Moore, Monique Adamczak, Jarmila Gajdisova, Sophie Ferguson and Christina Wheeler as some of fresh young faces it's hoped will help revive the flagging fortunes of tennis in this country.

He has overseen a relatively successful transformation of the rebound ace surface and secured funding to re-vamp dilapidated facilities.

Admittedly, this year's Open hasn't been flawless under Tilley's watch.

The capsicum spray let-off and lingering racial tensions have served to undermine Melbourne's "happy slam" status (blame Fed for the tag). But a misguided, patriotic debate over "robbing" one man's chances of winning a home slam doesn't have the same impact.

Hold fire. Perspective, not partisanship, should be Tilley's judge.