The Championships, Wimbledon: A Controversial week

Last Monday, Monfils was deprived of gaining the record for the fastest serve at Wimbledon during his 1^st round match against Gasquet. Apparently the speed gun spontaneously malfunctioned just on his record-breaking serve of 150mph. This seems to me to be a rather feeble explanation for their reading of his serve. I saw it live when he hit it and it was visibly extremely fast. Surely part of trying to host a major Grand Slam and widely-regarded prestigious event is making sure that all equipment is available to use and functioning accurately? Otherwise results and the record books will not reflect players’ achievements. The standard of the equipment and technology should be precise on all courts. Worse still, Court 2 is a main court and that day had a string of powerful servers on it who are capable of record-breaking serves, namely Venus Williams and Cilic alongside Monfils, whose fastest ever serve has been 142mph, which is an impressive speed and is only 8mph slower than the serve in question. Moreover, this is not the only match which had a technical hitch that day. When Kuznetsova challenged on match point down against Strycova, there was a long wait as hawkeye seemed unavailable. The umpire had to make an educated guess which resulted in Kuznetsova losing the match and consequently her ranking will drop to being outside the top 100. Perhaps her opponent’s ball was in but the problem is that hawkeye should have been able to swiftly provide an objective answer when the crucial match point needed to be checked. Hopefully, such surprising errors will be resolved and not occur in week 2 of Wimbledon.       

Other controversies included the amount of shock exits by seeds in just a week (Monday 2^nd July –Monday 9^th July). Today, Pliskova (seeded 7) became the last top ten seed to fall. Overall, only 6 out of the 32 seeds have survived long enough to be the last 8 players who make it to the quarter finals. Among these top seeds include the defending Wimbledon champion Muguruza, who was beaten by Van Uytvanck in round 2 on Thursday. They were playing on the new Court 2 which is nicknamed ‘the wok’ by players because it’s so hot on court you feel like you are frying! I wonder whether it plays significantly differently from other courts because it is also a so-called sunken court. As can be seen in the aerial shots of the Wimbledon grounds, Court 2 is below the level of the other courts and is not so affectionately still viewed as the graveyard of seeds despite its new location. This made me think: Does this sunken court suffer from a rising damp problem, so to speak? Is the turf absorbing more moisture from the earth up because it’s lying closer to a deeper level of soil which, as gardeners know, is damper than topsoil? If so, then it would make the ball bounce lower, lessen the effect of harder hit shots so potentially problematic for aggressive-style players while favouring an all-court game and making spins more effective. Muguruza was struggling because the balls weren’t sitting up as you would expect them to do on such a hot dry day. Van Uytvanck, however, has a rather nonchalant style of play which can catch a player off guard. She serves well and hits hard shots. However, it’s not always easy to know where she’s going to place the ball which, given her accuracy, makes her difficult to play. Rather like Hsieh, Van Uytvanck has a more old-fashioned game and is happy to come to the net. Van Uytvanck doesn’t have a particularly great record overall at Slams so I thought it was a nice gesture that she hoped her reaching the second week at Wimbledon would inspire younger players to ‘come out’. For more, see:

https://sports.nbcsports.com/2018/07/08/van-uytvanck-hoping-wimbledon-run-has-positive-impact/

While it shouldn’t be necessary to know someone’s sexual orientation, unfortunately, no sooner have gays made progress, there seems to be a negative backlash against them. Therefore, it is even more important for the LGBTQIA+ community to be visible. It was a touching gesture that, after winning her 3^rd round match, she kissed her girlfriend so creating clear visibility:

https://twitter.com/Renestance/status/1015567652272648192

Hsieh, coached by McNamee, took out Halep, the number 1 seed on centre court. She had Halep running around the court to return her balls. It must have felt to Halep that she was playing against a brick wall because her shots were being returned relentlessly by Hsieh. A tactic Hsieh used against Halep was the slice. This meant the ball stayed low so making it awkward for Halep to hit it with interest, while, at the same time, leaving her to generate all the pace. Hsieh, not only is good at absorbing the hard pace coming at her, but can herself generate pace when needed. In her TV interview behind Centre Court, Hsieh gave a fascinating insight into how she is very adaptable during a match. Depending on how she feels the match is going, she can choose to either play big shots and come in behind them to win points or to stay back and carefully construct the point to set up an opportunity to hit a winner. She relies on ‘feel’ which has the added disadvantage that her opponent cannot predict how she ‘feels’ she should be playing. In this way, she stays very alert and responsive to match conditions as the match develops and unfolds. This makes her style in line with past generations of players who often had to think through matches on their own because they didn’t have a travelling coach with them. Most players these days also opt to focus on their own game and pre-match strategy and not take in what their opponent is doing mid-match or think about how to counteract their style. I think this may sometimes become a hindrance because you can only play your game to the extent that your opponent lets you. However, Cibulkova didn’t allow Hsieh to dictate today. This was especially evident deeper into this match when Cibulkova managed to ‘jam’ the ball closer to her body and up the middle of the court so not leaving Hsieh any space to hit a slice or angles with ease. This was effective because it meant that Hsieh had to play the match on Cibulkova’s terms. She turned the situation around so that Hsieh was the one feeling as though she was hitting against a brick wall because Cibulkova hits hard, has good angles, is uber-positive and adrenaline-fuelled.

Halep berated herself post-match for being too negative in her match against Hsieh and thereby losing her 5-2 lead. However, I think it’s easy to let the losing-a-match-blues get to you when you come off court. On analysing the match, I’m not convinced Halep’s psychology let her down in itself. I suspect her negativity and overactive left-brain thinking was merely a natural result of surrounding factors. One, the pre-match strategy didn’t match what she came up against on court. She knew she mixes things up a lot but wasn’t prepared for how idiosyncratic Hsieh can be in a match or how adaptable and changeable she is mid-match. So at any point in the match, Hsieh can discover a type of shot you can’t deal with and keeps using it to gain momentum and make a comeback. She’s also not someone Halep comes across on tour. They have only met once on the WTA, back in 2013 on an American hard court which Halep won. So both players have to rely more on feeling out the strengths and weaknesses of their opponent under pressure during the match which is Hsieh’s strength. This is not a strength players look for so it’s easier for Halep to feel like she lost it through her own negativity rather than due to her opponent’s lesser spotted match-style. Two, Halep seems to periodically complain of being extremely tired and being in pain, not just due to a specific injury but an all-body aching pain. Why is this? Physical exhaustion and pain could be causing her apparent negativity not her attitude. All athletes suffer exhaustion and pain to a certain extent but Halep seems to be suffering more than one would anticipate. She already works with a psychologist so her sports psychology is unlikely to be letting her down. Perhaps addressing her physical symptoms through sports science may give her the energy she needs to stay positive on court because she is a terrific player and works very hard, fighting for every point.