British Tennis Forum - Celebrating 20 Years!

9vicman · Futures qualifying

RE: Weeks 27 & 28 - The Championships, Wimbledon (Womens') (grass) - main draw

PaulM · Tennis legend

She confirmed in the interview after the match she was a late call up to replace Thomas' original partner.

Yes it's quite a good pay day for just taking part!

9vicman · Futures qualifying

PaulM wrote:
She confirmed in the interview after the match she was a late call up to replace Thomas' original partner.

Yes it's quite a good pay day for just taking part!

Ah yes, often the case in the past.

foobarbaz · Strong Club Player

Re. Adding technology can have the opposite effect to that intended. Players will play to the limit of that technology to get an edge, where perhaps they wouldn't have done that pre-tech. Take VAR in soccer for example, now players play for the slightest touch and scream at the ref, knowing that if VAR gets involved the idea that footie is a contact sport goes right out the window.

indiana · Tennis legend

foobarbaz wrote:
Re. Adding technology can have the opposite effect to that intended. Players will play to the limit of that technology to get an edge, where perhaps they wouldn't have done that pre-tech. Take VAR in soccer for example, now players play for the slightest touch and scream at the ref, knowing that if VAR gets involved the idea that footie is a contact sport goes right out the window.

FWIW I have seen VAR being good with a lot of such cases. Pre VAR many such cases on the face of it looked absolutely genuine and were given, whereas VAR has often seen such as the 'fouled' player initiating the contact and overturned a ref's initial decision. What I guess is different is they are left with the having to have some contact to have a chance, with the straight dive cases going to be laughed out of court so not worth it any more. Net net less simulation wrong decisions.

Of course many will still disagree with some decisions ( some have retrospectively been admitted as wrong ) but here as generally in football, VAR has improved decision making. The time often taken, the interruptions, is a separate discussion.

indiana · Tennis legend

emmsie69 wrote:
That's not a criticism of Amanda, it's just a lot of money for a pretty rubbish match, that's the nature of Sport but prices are so high now it's not worth taking a chance that you'll get a classic.

While I feel for the people who paid to be there and hoped for a great match, as you say it's the nature of sport that stuff happens. Indeed this was kind of sport at its purest where nothing is guaranteed when we are ultimately dealing with individuals' strengths and fallabilities.

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

Yes, and to be honest, at least they'll be able to say 'I was at Wimbledon when A got completely annihilated, could barely lift her arm up or move her feet, it was a really weird match .....'

As opposed to 'I was at Wimbledon when B won 6-2 6-3 and was always a break up and there was never any question who was going to win, it was just going through the motions'

Which is far less of a story

GAMEOVER · Satellite level

GAMEOVER wrote:
Putintseva beat Iga at Wimbledon last year and lost to Amanda in the first round this year without winning a game. How many games has Iga won in a row,? It is 18 + with the Bencic match. Back in 1925 one hundred years ago Suzanne Lenglen won Wimbledon only losing 2 games in the final and 50 years later in 1975 Billie Jean only dropped 1 game in the final, It was a historic tournament for Polish women's tennis as Iga won Polish women their first ever title at senior Wimbledon.

Add Iga was the first Polish player to win a senior title at Wimbledon.They did have the ladies runner up in 1937 beaten by Dorothy Round .It is surprising that Iga has not done well at Wimbledon until this year as she won Junior Wimbledon unseeded in 2018. Onr route she beat Emma. Since Iga won junior Wimbledon we are waiting for the later winners and runnerups to have similar success at senior level.

HarryGem · Club Coach

the addict wrote:
£210 a ticket for the QF's on Tuesday on No 1 court. Did get yo see Taylor Fritz, Amanda Anisimova and a fabulous women's doubles with Kudermetova and Mertens agai st Dabrowski and Routliffe.

I was there too with our son that day. A decent day's tennis if not spectacular.

The following link gives all the prices for this year's Wimbledon if anyone is interested.

Wimbledon Ticket Prices - The Championships, Wimbledon - Official Site by IBM

HarryGem · Club Coach

Helen40 wrote:
I'm all for not influencing the umpire, and if we make them all into robots, I'm not sure tennis would keep it's fan base. It's the characters and rivalries that that make it. Look at Kyrios - box office due to being a character (whether I agree with all he does or not)

Toilet break wise, I don't think you can just have a blanket rule of five minutes, just due to the proximity in some places, but maybe a calculation of time to get there plus urm 'execution' time. I wonder about something like the stop clock rule, but over a season or something. So with the stop clock rule, I think the umpires only call them out on it if their average is above the 25 seconds - so a version of that. Again, for me it would be good to stop that gamesmanship.

The toilet break is fast becoming a farce. Obviously there can be different reasons for needing one but in the women's game it does seem to be quite often a case of lose a set take a break.

I was watching one woman's match on TV last year and the first set was over in 19 minutes. The player who lost it then went for a toilet break which lasted 8 minutes before the next point was played, not far short of half the length of the entire first set. I'm not sure how this can be dealt with whilst protecting those with legitimate needs but something does need to be done.

indiana · Tennis legend

I think I'm a bit in the minority about not being that fussed about toilet breaks. Although with many things there can actually be a silent majority for at least being "not fussed".

Sure a lot of the time it will be gamemanship or at least a player trying to get more composed. But you can't trully tell.

So impose resonable time limits for all, and for opposing players it's just something they have to deal with, indeed be coached to deal with if necessary.

DF · Tennis legend

I think that this makes sense. There is no point getting worked up over the amount of time the opponent is away as they are overseen so should not
be able to 'cheat'. Enjoy a rest between sets or whatever is allowed eg chat with team.

Lambda · ATP level

Toilet breaks have been time limited for 2 or 3 years after they became a talking point when Tsitsipas took a long toilet break against Andy at the US Open. Women are allowed 1 break in a match for either a toilet break of 3 minutes, a change of clothes break of 5 minutes or a toilet and change of clothes break of 5 minutes, starting from the time they enter the toilet/change area to when they leave it. Any other toilet break must be taken during the normal change of end time limit.