Wimbledon, still the biggest prize in the game
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The ultimate destination of every young tyro, writes Rohit Brijnath
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This week in London, like a summer ritual, the questions will rain. Does this tournament mean the most to you? It is meant as a rhetorical question really, and it is a conceited one. Still, players will play along and say “Yes”, whereupon they will be asked: “Why is this place special?” And here, too, it is understood, no argument is expected, this place is special. After all, this is Wimbledon.
Most players genuflect on command, though not, initially, those rebellious foreigners. John McEnroe wrote that as a teenager he thought: “How could anyone expect me to take all this strawberries and cream malarkey seriously?” Connors, the blue-collar hero, said: “New Yorkers love it when you spill your guts out there. Spill your guts at Wimbledon and they make you stop and clean it up”. But winning, and time, helps appreciation and eventually they came around.
Wimbledon is the ultimate destination of every young tyro from distant lands, who are raised with tales of this oldest of Slams. Federer was so anxious on his first visit, so overcome at having made it to Wimbledon finally, that he couldn’t serve. Wimbledon, he said, “can be very intimidating. The white (clothes), the tradition, the fans, the grass, the whole thing, it’s a tough, tough package.”
In A Touch of Tennis, the story of the Krishnan family, written with Nirmal Shekar, Ramanathan Krishnan writes: “Nothing meant more to me than playing Wimbledon and Davis Cup and all the money in the world (he had been given a n offer to turn professional) could not have forced me to miss these.” At Calcutta’s South Club, the most telling boast was not of dramatic matches that had occurred there, but that the lawns occasionally rivalled Wimbledon’s.
This seduction extends to the casual spectator. He may be uninterested in the relative merits of Rebound Ace and Deco Turf, yet will expound expertly on curtsying, royalty, weather delays and the virtues of Robinsons barley water.
For many such fans, the game’s history is recollected through episodes at Wimbledon. It is where Becker launched power tennis (1985), Agassi won his first Slam (1992) and the legend of Borg (1976-80) was cemented (so what if he won six French). It is where Cash walked on people’s heads (1987), Pete walked on water (1993-95, 1997-2000) and Rosewall’s heart broke as he walked into a wall called Connors (1974).
So what if great deeds were accomplished elsewhere. Elsewhere was seen as secondary. Wimbledon was not just the “nursery of the game”, as A. Wallis Myers wrote; it was also “the final assessor of form”. As if only winning here gave a champion legitimacy, a statement of some truth and arrogance.
Wimbledon is modern (it has redone its press centre, No.1 court, and is roofing Centre Court), yet its value lies in its old world charm, its dignified manner. Arthur Ashe once wrote: “British traditions are just a bit more traditional than anybody else’s. Given a head start the British can always make their things seem more important than anybody else’s.”
Good business
Tradition is also good business. The more we are assaulted by the excesses of modern sport, the more we crave Wimbledon. Even for players, it is a brief journey into another universe. We’re so tired of preening stars and officials gloating about some mega-trillion TV deal that we’re ready to buy into all thus hushed-cathedral stuff.
When the U.S. (1975) and Australian (1988) abandoned grass, Wimbledon turned even more exclusive. In fact, with the erosion of the grass-court season, Wimbledon’s foreignness (strange surface, maddening weather) became its attraction, and challenge.
But the tournament suffered, too. Once it was the theatre for the art of serve and volley, but that art has died. Now watching players labour from the baseline there is like going to La Scala in Milan and hearing a Hollywood musical.
An era of Hewitt-Nalbandian finals (the 2002 final had not one serve-volley point) would have punished the senses, but a Swiss fellow has rescued Wimbledon. He volleys, wears old-fashioned coats, and behaves like a gent. Federer needs the tougher French to confirm his greatness, but what matters to the All England Club is which trophy means the most to him. Wimbledon.
http://www.hindu.com/2007/06/21/stories/2007062156402200.htm
AuthorTopic: Wimbledon, still the biggest prize in the game (Read 701 times)
July 09, 2006, 06:28:44 PM