A Splendid Day At Wimbledon On “Second Monday”, 8 July 2024

Rune & Djokovic Squaring Up Ahead of Centre Court Battle

I scored us a pair of centre court tickets for the second Monday of Wimbledon this year. Not bad, I hear you cry. I thought it was a smart move this year. I always thought that “Manic Monday” was better observed from the comfort of a living room and a gadget that enables switching between channels. But the craziness of “Manic Monday” has, in theory, been dissipated by the use of “Middle Sunday” for half of the draw.

Theory and practice failed to collide this year, with so much rain through Week One and Middle Sunday, that our Monday, which was blessed with good weather until early evening, was pretty manic.

Still, we were scheduled to see the following matches on Centre Court…

  • Elena Rybakina v Anna Kalinskaya
  • Taylor Fritz v Alexander Zverev
  • Novak Djokovic v Holger Rune

…and there was loads to see on outer courts.

Taylor Townsend & Katerina Siniakova on Court 18

We arrived a little late to get in to one of the main outer courts for the first match of the day, but after wandering around for a short while, I worked out that we’d get on to Court 18 to see at least part of the conclusion of a rain-affected Ladies Doubles including several players we like: Katerina Siniakova & Taylor Townsend v Leylah Fernandez & Ena Shibahara.

Rain constantly threatened but didn’t come until late afternoon

We bailed out of Court 18 before the finish, keen to see the first match on Centre Court.

Elena Rybakina & Anna Kalinskaya

After the first set, I went out to stretch my legs, only to discover, on my return after the first three games of the second set, that Kalinskaya had retired. Still, my leg-stretching had enabled me to spec out the neighbouring outer courts, where some of the youngster action was now underway.

Flora Johnson

We watched Flora Johnson overcome Alena Kovackova before returning for the start of the Fritz v Zverev match – a rare example of a match between two players with Z in their surname.

Zverev hitting

Having consumed my hot smoked salmon bagel during the first match, perhaps my defences were down. Or perhaps it was the relentless big serves and not much else at the start of that match. Anyway, I must confess that Janie caught me napping during the first set and kindly prevented what might have been a notorious snore-gate incident.

I did the leg stretch thing again at the start of the second set and returned for the end of that set, which also went Zverev’s way. I suggested to Janie that the rest of the match was only going to be interesting if Fritz revived and that would take quite some time. Janie agreed, so we decided to wander around some more and take in the outer courts.

Janie’s eye’s fell on some mixed doubles: Jan Zielinski & Su-Wei Hsieh v Hugo Nys & Demi Schuurs.

Hugo Nys & Demi Schuurs

Su-Wei Hsieh

It really is a privilege to be able to watch these fantastic players at such close quarters on those outer courts.

Then we focussed on some more youngsters for a while: Henry Bernet & Flynn Thomas v Mark Ceban & Charlie Swaine.

Mark Ceban & Charlie Swaine

Then to Court 14, where I spotted that an interesting-looking mixed doubles was about to start: Maximo Gonzalez & Ulrikke Eikeri v Jean-Julien Rojer & Bethanie Mattek-Sands…

…but not before Janie snapped some hydrangeas that took her fancy:

Bettanie serves

Ulrikke Eikeri & Maximo Gonzalez

All the while I was keeping an eye on the score from Centre Court. Once it became clear that the fourth set between Fritz and Zverev was heading for a tie-break, I suggested that we return to see the end of that match, one way or another.

That we did and it was a well worthwhile switch. That tie break was excellent and Fritz went up through the gears in the final set.

Fritz, victorious

We stuck around for the first set of Rune v Djokovic (see headline picture), but by then we had seen plenty and thought that people queuing for returns were more deserving than us.

Besides, it had started raining and it looked as thought he rain would only get worse. We quite fancied getting home before the proper heavy stuff.

The young lad from Guest Services admired my poncho, describing it as “stunning”. Excellent taste, some youngsters these days, excellent taste and good choice of advective. He even sounded as though he meant it.

Here is a link to the order of play with results for the whole day.

We didn’t go too mad with the camera at this one – we were a bit photo-ed out from Eastbourne. But if you want to see all 60 pictures, here they are on Flickrt:

We always have a a great day at Wimbledon. This day, despite its frenetic nature, was no exception.

A Day At The Queen’s Club Watching Young Guns Play Lawners, 21 June 2023

My visits to The Queen’s Club aren’t all about playing real tennis and winning tournaments/trophies myself.

Gosh no.

Janie and I decided to spend a day watching the grass court tournament at Queen’s this year, as well as several days at other less high-falutin’ tournaments such as Eastbourne and Wimbledon (see subsequent Ogblogs for those).

Being Wednesday, we got to see four of the Round Of 16 matches. We saw:

  • Lorenzo Musetti beat Ben Shelton;
  • Cameron Norrie beat Jordan Thompson;
  • Holger Rune beat Ryan Peniston;
  • Sebastian Korda beat Frances Tiafoe.

Lots of players we like and/or wanted to see on that list, so we were very pleased with our schedule for the day.

We also strolled the campus a fair bit, although the place was very crowded compared with our previous visit to see lawners during the socially-distanced summer of 2021:

Returning to 2023, we took loads of photographs, more of players we weren’t going to see practicing on practice courts than pictures of our own matches.

Here’s a sample of them, ahead of a link which will allow you to skim the whole lot:

Tim Henman, Annabel Croft & Catherine Whitaker

The view from our pews – not badBen Shelton getting ready to serve

Lorenzo Musetti in full flow

Diego Schwartzman practicing

Lloyd Glasspool practicing

Daisy & Ged model a fridge for reasons known only to the Haider marketing team

Daisy gets busy with the selfies

Cam Norrie heads our way

Adrian Mannarino at practice

Ryan Peniston takes the ball

Holger Rune serves

Commentators on a balcony behind us. At one point Annabel came and sat right behind us

Frances Tiafoe

Sebastian Korda

We had a very enjoyable day, although I must say that the Queen’s tournament feels a bit more corporate, less fun & friendly, each time we go there now.

Here and below a link to all of our photos from that day.