'Just Stop Oil' protestors interrupt not one, but two, matches at Wimbledon

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Rain wasn't the only thing interrupting play at Wimbledon on Wednesday.

As inclement weather affected the tournament for the second straight day, protesters from the organization 'Just Stop Oil' ran onto Court 18 twice: first, in a brief patch of play in a first-round match between Grigor Dimitrov and Sho Shimabukuro, and later, during the women's singles match between Katie Boulter and Daria Saville.

The first interruption came when Dimitrov lead by a set and ready to serve at 1-0 in the second set: Two protesters ran out, and doused the court with orange confetti and glitter, before being apprehended by security and escorted off. In the second match, as Boulter and Saville changed ends at 4-2 in the first-set tiebreak, a third man ran on court and tossed more.

It was reported last month that the organization had plans to make a statement at Wimbledon, and Wimbledon is the latest major event to see the group's protests. It also protested at London Pride last month, and at the high-profile Ashes Test cricket event.

'Just Stop Oil' is a U.K. environmentalist organization that describes itself as "a coalition of groups working together to ensure the Government commits to halting new fossil fuel licensing and production," per its website. In a tweet, the organization said that it was protesting Wimbledon's sponsorship deal with Barclays which, it claimed, had "given £30 billion to oil and gas companies ... in the last two years."

During one of the brief periods of clear skies on Wednesday afternoon, the matches were both briefly suspended as the court needed to be cleaned up. Boulter and Saville even joined in the efforts to collect the second round of confetti.

On the eve of the tournament, Andy Murray told reporters that he believed there would be a "good chance" that Wimbledon would be a venue for a protest by the organization.

“I think there is probably a good chance of something happening,” he said, per The Guardian. “I am not sure how many times I have had somebody run on the court when I am actually playing. It may have been once but I am not sure it has been more than that.

"I was talking about it with my family the other day. I don’t know, if somebody ran on to the court and came towards you, what your reaction would be to that because you don’t know who it is or what they are doing or why they are doing it. I don’t know if they would attach themselves to the net or throw something on to the court–they have to be a bit careful going too near to tennis players who have obviously got rackets in their hands.

“I would imagine probably something would happen here. I mean, I agree with the cause – just not always how they go about expressing it. Rather than running on the court, maybe they could do it a different way.”

Per a tweet by The Sunday Times reporter Stuart Fraser, the first two protestors were removed from the grounds by police. The third protestor, per further reporting by the iPaper's James Gray, was 66-year-old William John Ward, a retired civil engineer.

In aftermath of both incidents, the tournament issued a statement saying that the protestors were "arrested on suspicion of aggravated trespass and criminal damage."