Wimbledon’s troubled timing
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Wimbledon, currently being played in London, is the first Tennis championships and is in its 131st year, since it began in 1877. It is the most prestigious of the 4 Grand Slam events and in addition, now winning the French Open and Wimbledon is referred to as the Channel-Slam. Both being played on either side of the English channel. Winning the Wimbledon title entitles membership to the All England Club, the venue of Wimbledon Championships, and also etches winners’ name in stone in the Tennis world.
With all its prestige, prominence and now giving out as much as 2.2 million Sterling pounds each to the Singles winners and over 30,000 Sterling pounds for the 1st Round loser, the event seems to be having the wrong dates. By the time Wimbledon begins, the global professional circuit has gone through the Spring hard court season and the strenuous European clay court season. By this time, most players are very tired and physically and mentally struggling to perform.
In the first 3 days of the event which began this year on July 3, the number of retirement of players in the early Rounds, without finishing their matches, were over 10. It is very disturbing, considering that, this year onwards, Wimbledon decided to give prize money even if a player retires. Prominent players including Roger Federer have voiced their displeasure. His opponent, Ukrainia’s Dolgopolov retired just 43 minutes into the match, after losing the 1st Set and down 3-0.
Some of the top 150 ranked players seem to be on the threshold of injury, when they arrive to play at Wimbledon, and go home with 30,000 Pounds Sterling, without performing, is not an acceptable code of conduct. Could this be because the Wimbledon dates are at the wrong place in the calendar.
The 2 professional bodies are considering corrective measures which could include to make best of 5 Sets, 3 and even making the Sets shorter to 4 games instead of 6. Conservatives are against such moves. After all, it is not only the professionals who play Tennis.
The hard grind
The Professional season is long, lasting almost 11 months. When players have to player continuously for weeks, it is hard and, when it lasts for months, it is not a ‘business-as-usual’ situation. The retirement of players against good opponents is an issue to the Wimbledon box office. To my memory, the number of retirement by players in the 1st Round has never been this high as in this Wimbledon.
The question of success at what cost, is looming over Tennis and other sports. The intensity of training for international sport could easily be termed as ‘brutal’. The end effect of it is worn out physique and psychological disturbances in youth. Brutal training to develop could last a decade. Trying to peak for events, players physically and mentally break down too. This Wimbledon did show these trends.
Bookmakers choice
Even with issues, Wimbledon was not short of good Tennis and exciting actions. Surprise losses were that of 3rd Seeded Swiss Stan Wawrinka and French, Seeded player Gasguet to Spain’s David Ferrer. Both Gasguet and Wawrinka played too many matches in the last 4 weeks. With all this, the bookmakers seem to have chosen Roger Federer, who rested the entire clay court season, as the favourite for the title. The two youngsters, Austria’s Dominic Thiem and Germany’s Alex Zverev are also possible contenders. Their issue is to get comfortable in the very short grass season.
For the Women’s title, the bets are on Czech Republics Karolina Pliskova. On the show of strength, French Open winner Ostapenko could prove to be the dark horse again. She is a seasoned campaigner on grass.
ITF Futures in Colombo
While the top ranked players of the world are busy on grass in Europe, Colombo hosted 3 US$ 15,000 professional events for Men. A good number turned out from overseas. As our player development falls well short for this kind of events in standard of play, 3 local players entered the draw on ‘wild card’ entry entitlement of the hosting country. The highest ranked player in these events had a world ranking of around 350.
Our epicurean interest in player development, individually and collectively as a nation, is weak or, so to say, does not exist. The player count of thousands we give out are those of schoolchildren playing Tennis. We do not have any ATP ranked players at the moment. The maturity of players come from the national standard and the amount of exposure to international competition Tennis. To get these, players need an environment of good Tennis standard and suitable events. Since we lost the good Tennis standard a good few decades ago, our players now will have to locate themselves in regions of the world where good standard and events exist.
Harshana Goddamana who lives in Boston, USA, entered a semifinal in the 2nd Leg of the Colombo Futures. According to him, he is 32-years-old and this is his final year in our Davis Cup team. The Group 3 event starting from July 17 in Colombo. In the meantime, the 2nd week of Wimbledon will entertain us.
-George Paldano, Former int. player; Accredited Coach of Germany; National, Davis-Cup, Federation Cup captain/coach– geodano2015@gmail.com –