Euro clay and grass event clusters
From the 1970’s natural surfaces began to give into artificial surfaces for easy maintenance. Arguably, the exhibition of the game suffered on artificial surfaces. Of recent, nearly four decades later, the surface preference is reversing. Europe home of good many popular sports is reverting to natural surfaces to exhibit tennis. Their effort is to bring back the artistry and tactical variety. Both of these are of spectator appeal.
Prior to the French Open this year, Europe had back-to-back clay court events in Eastern and Western Europe for eight weeks. The same trend has appeared for grass prior to Wimbledon. ATP this year had grass court events in the Netherlands, two in Germany, one in Spain, and two in England. WTA had in Germany and in England.
Much enhanced grass field technology is making tennis very inviting. Few decades back, speed and very low bounce of the grass court reduced the average length of a rally to three shots and the quality of the grass did not last through an event effectively. Modern grass is different. Present grass courts permits longer rallies.
Wimbledon 2021
Today, June 28, the 134th version of the Wimbledon Grass Court Championships will begin. It is for the All-England tennis title. The qualifying rounds began on June 21. For British sports, it will be a pilot project to test the COVID-19 safety measures. The arrangements are to eliminate exposure risk in event management. Wimbledon prize money this will be US$ 49 million. The winner will get nearly two million dollars and the first round loser gets 48,000 dollars.
Absentees
The organisers are targeting to permit 25% spectators for the early rounds and progress to 50%, 75% and 100% for the finals. Among the precautions are, any person entering Wimbledon grounds must show proof of vaccine minimum of two weeks old and a under 48-hour COVID negative test result. The players will have to stay in official hotel and not in housing of their choice. All of these along with others are to eliminate the risk. The ever popularity gaining Henman-Hill open-air TV screen viewers outside the centre court of Wimbledon could be with facemask this year. Tough times and tough calls!
Some of the past champions and top ranked players have indicated that the will not appear in London. Nadal and good many others for body recovery, Osaka has unresolved issues with press conference and others with travel issues and quarantine issues. There is no way any event could have full strength of players from all five continents in the prevailing conditions.
2020 Wimbledon was not staged; it was the first cancellation since the second world war. The extension of the controlled lockdown in London by another month announced recently will not be too conducive for this year’s event.
Men’s favourite will be Djokovic and prince in waiting Greek Tsitsipas. Zverev of Germany will be very effective on grass. A new set of New-Gen players are emerging and dominating tennis now. This is true in women and in men.
In women’s tennis, the dominance of teenagers and early 20s is visible. Serena, with so many others like Sharapova made tennis come through very difficult transitional times. In men. Federer, Nadal, Murray and few others did that part. They are lingering with their last phase of professional span of competition. A former German Wimbledon finalist told me, every player reaches the point of physical breakdown and very slow recovery. In elite tennis ‘time’ will be against aging players.
Rare fete of Krejcikova in Paris
The 23-year-old Barbora Krejcikova of Czech Republic is the first person since Mary Pierce in the 1990s to win the singles and doubles of the French Open titles together. As a junior Krejcikova won the French Open junior title. In her interview she revealed how much of the tactical approach of doubles saw her through in winning the singles. It has helped her in critically in the service department, tactical shot selection, all court coverage positioning and rhythm change to play at baseline and net.
Krejcikova hails from the Czech tennis tradition from Jan Kodes, Martina Navratilova, Ivan Lendl, Kvitova and others. Czech Republic always had strong cluster of players providing maturity to youngsters. Krejcikova’s partner in doubles for the French Open Title was a known Czech player with good WTA record, Katerina Siniakova.
Future in Tennis
To be skillful will be the way to develop into be a successful tennis player. With media interest increasing, exhibition of emotion with wide-open-mouth is fine for the photo imagery, it will not win the next point to win the match. The extreme expression on the court was to intimidate the opponent. It does not frighten anyone anymore but will get a notice from the umpire. It is coming.
Tennis came to being with a certain set of norms to be appealing to play and to watch. Wimbledon is trying hard to keep the ‘charm’ of tennis in a professionally dominated sports world. It is anybody’s guess as to which way it is going. If it goes the wrong way, tennis will be an exit-sport before too long.
—George Paldano, former international player; Accredited Coach of German Tennis Federation; National coach Brunei and Sri Lanka, coached ATP, WTA and ITF top 200 ranked players, Davis-Cup, Federation-Cup coach. — geodano2015@gmail.com