Weeks 26-27 - Wimbledon men's main draw (Andy)

indiana · Tennis legend

RE: Weeks 26-27 - Wimbledon men's main draw (Andy)

Helen40 · Grand Slam Champion

indiana wrote:
I watched highlights of the last few games of the Cilic vs Berdych match.

That was pretty outrageous keeping them on till 9.38 ( a Wimbledon record ), in such poor light, and when evidently Berdych was complaining for a number of games.

Gee, they were the top half of the draw, so could still have completed today, or in the event of threatened and actual bad weather would still be generally better off than the bottom half when the two halves combined their days next week.

Fortunately, Tomas has been actually publicly quite amusing about it with a tweet picture of two eyes staring from the dark. But shifting them from Court 1 to Court 3 and then keeping them on stupidly late to complete the set ( and as it turned out, the match ) was very poor by Wimbledon.

And to add insult to injury, did you see the ridiculous scheduling yesterday once play finally got started?? They put the kids on in front of the men so that two 3rd round mens matches have yet to be started!!

I'm not sure why Tomas being publicly amusing about it is fortunate. I think in the circumstances having a rant would have been more appropriate. Totally ridiculous keeping them on when they can hardly see the ball.

indiana · Tennis legend

You are right, Helen.

I guess I more meant "fortunate" for the Wimbledon authorities that Tomas didn't make more of it. But this is a Slam, and noone should be getting treated like that, let alone the no 6 seed, who at least might have been more listened to.

Of course, spectators like to see a finish, and I absolutely understand Marin being happy to play on ( whatever he really thought of the conditions ), but this was ridiculous.

indiana · Tennis legend

Ha, the Fed ( vs Robredo ) and Nadal ( vs Kyrgios ) L16 matches are not scheduled for Monday.

Seems fair enough, since the other bottom half L16 matches to provide their potential QF opponents can't take place before Tuesday.

So the plan is clearly to play all the bottom half L16 matches on Tuesday and the whole of the bottom half ( including Fed and Rafa ) gets a bit backed up ( at least to the extent of playing L16 and QF on successive days ).

Shame :)

RJA · Hall of fame

indiana wrote:
I watched highlights of the last few games of the Cilic vs Berdych match.

That was pretty outrageous keeping them on till 9.38 ( a Wimbledon record ), in such poor light, and when evidently Berdych was complaining for a number of games.

Gee, they were the top half of the draw, so could still have completed today, or in the event of threatened and actual bad weather would still be generally better off than the bottom half when the two halves combined their days next week.

Fortunately, Tomas has been actually publicly quite amusing about it with a tweet picture of two eyes staring from the dark. But shifting them from Court 1 to Court 3 and then keeping them on stupidly late to complete the set ( and as it turned out, the match ) was very poor by Wimbledon.

No sympathy what so ever with Berdych. It sums up why he is such an under achiever. Remember at Queen's last year when Murray was sent out to play on a damp court, he simply refused to play and made everyone wait the best part of half an hour for the court to dry.

Once at it got to around 9:15 Berdych should have told the umpire that he wasn't willing to play in these conditions, if the umpire refused he should have then called the referee, a request that the umpire cannot refuse. By the time that the referee had made his way out to the court a few more minutes would have gone. Berdych could then have then spent a good few minutes arguing with the referee at which point it would be even darker and clearly impossible to finish the match. Worse case scenario refuse to play and dare them to default you, no way would they ever do it.

Murray, Fed, Rafa or Nole would have all stood up for themselves. Berdych didn't and that it is one of the major differences between them and him.

indiana · Tennis legend

Oh yes, to my mind Berdych should have been much stronger about it if he was really very unhappy about the light ( and he was clearly unhappy ). His fault.

But it shouldn't have needed that. Common sense appeared to say that they shouldn't have been out there in that light, even before they got to a record late time, and with one player complaining for a number of games ( and the other, probably for understandable competitive reasons, not ).

However, yes a lesson learned, which he shouldn't need. Don't rely on the competency of officials, sometimes you need to be more proactive.

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

indiana wrote:
Ha, the Fed ( vs Robredo ) and Nadal ( vs Kyrgios ) L16 matches are not scheduled for Monday.

Seems fair enough, since the other bottom half L16 matches to provide their potential QF opponents can't take place before Tuesday.

So the plan is clearly to play all the bottom half L16 matches on Tuesday and the whole of the bottom half ( including Fed and Rafa ) gets a bit backed up ( at least to the extent of playing L16 and QF on successive days ).

Shame :)

Magnus certainly not happy:

Magnus Norman @normansweden · 19h

Rain today. Got canceled. No play sunday bcause tradition. Now the bracket with Stan has to play 3 days b2b best of 5 if wanna go through

Madeline · Admin:Moderator + Tennis Legend

Unfortunate - but the weather has mucked up all the other slams several years, hurricanes, rain, excessive heat, you name it: they play middle Sunday and still have problems with the schedule so that some players suffer. Look how the USO has had to finish on the Monday for several years, and with Stupid Saturday to further complicate matters!

BeefyDeedz · Pro player

Coup Droit wrote:
indiana wrote:
Ha, the Fed ( vs Robredo ) and Nadal ( vs Kyrgios ) L16 matches are not scheduled for Monday.

Seems fair enough, since the other bottom half L16 matches to provide their potential QF opponents can't take place before Tuesday.

So the plan is clearly to play all the bottom half L16 matches on Tuesday and the whole of the bottom half ( including Fed and Rafa ) gets a bit backed up ( at least to the extent of playing L16 and QF on successive days ).

Shame :)

Magnus certainly not happy:

Magnus Norman @normansweden · 19h
Rain today. Got canceled. No play sunday bcause tradition. Now the bracket with Stan has to play 3 days b2b best of 5 if wanna go through

In his interview with Sky Sports News, Magnus was more accepting and at least accepted that Wimbledon had done right by cancelling and scheduling the bottom half for Tuesday. Still irritated, but perhaps shows that his tweet was more with an unfortunate sigh rather than anger.

http://www1.skysports.com/tennis/news/30778/9365703/wimbledon-stan-wawrinka-has-potentially-daunting-week-ahead-says-coach

"To try to be fair to all of the players in the bottom half of the men's draw, no fourth-round matches in that section will be played on Monday, meaning all Tuesday's winners will have to play again on Wednesday.

Norman backed the decision, saying: "That's one thing that they've done to try to be fair to all the players.

"It's not an easy decision for anyone because we have also the Sunday off with the tradition at Wimbledon.

"The best thing for the players would be to play on Sunday and have Monday off but you have to take everything into consideration and I think they're doing a great job trying to be fair to everyone."

Spectator · All-time great

I understand what the issues were around Isner/Lopez in particular: that match was pretty well guaranteed to go long, so starting it late would have been no use to anyone. But - forgive me, this is not intended as a sexist comment - given that the men play best of five, would it not have made sense to have prioritised the men's matches across the board that day, so that no one was going to have to do back-to-back five set matches? Back-to-back best of three is bad, but not as bad as five.

steven · Tennis legend

Spectator wrote:
I understand what the issues were around Isner/Lopez in particular: that match was pretty well guaranteed to go long, so starting it late would have been no use to anyone. But - forgive me, this is not intended as a sexist comment - given that the men play best of five, would it not have made sense to have prioritised the men's matches across the board that day, so that no one was going to have to do back-to-back five set matches? Back-to-back best of three is bad, but not as bad as five.

It probably would have, yes, but they may have thought the fact that the women's QFs are scheduled for Tuesday and the men's for Wednesday made it more important to get the women's matches completed, who knows.

RJA · Hall of fame

Tougher match for Andy today but another straight sets win. He really is a delightful player on grass.

Madeline · Admin:Moderator + Tennis Legend

The third set was a little bit worrying, but I did feel that if it went to a fourth, Andy would come through. Glad he did it in straight sets again though.

steven · Tennis legend

Andy gets through to the Wimbledon QFs without dropping a set for the 2nd year in a row (3rd time in total) to set up a clash of the last two Queen's Club ATP champs. It will be Andy's 7th Wimbledon QF in a row (W 5 L 1) and his 20th singles QF in all slams (W 14 L 5):

L16: (3) Andy Murray WR 5 beat (20) Kevin Anderson (RSA) WR 18 (= CH) by 6-4 6-3 7-6(6)

QF: (3) Andy Murray WR 5 v (11) Grigor Dimitrov (BUL) WR 13 (CH 12 in May)

H2H 3-1 but Dimitrov won the last time they met, in Acapulco earlier this year.

BeefyDeedz · Pro player

I thought that was another step-up from Murray and that, in the third, Anderson probably did the most he could against Andy's style of play. Definitely a good win, and to do it in straights gives him optimum preparation for the QFs.

I'll be interested to see if the BBC production team are going to go one further and call Dimitrov Andy's 'first real test' like they did against Bautista Agut...and then Anderson...

Similarly, it was interesting to hear the opinions of Mark and Tim who both seemed happy to suggest that Dimitrov was now part of a 'fantastic five'. Sure, Grigor has had a great year, but am I the only one who things that he has a lot more to do before putting himself in that sort of company? Except Johnny Mac, who at least tries to tell it as it is.

Andy v Grigor should be a great match and although I think that Murray is looking strong enough to deal with his threat, I would prefer Andy to lose to somebody like Grigor or Raonic as opposed to a Ferrer or Wawrinka. So best of luck to both men.