Week 26 - Wimbledon - London (grass) - women's main draw

Jajon · Club Coach

Week 26 - Wimbledon - London (grass) - women's main draw

indiana · Tennis legend

In a statement, Wimbledon after expressing their sadness about Emma's retiral and wishing her all the best and looking forward to welcoming her back next year, defended their scheduling ...

In respect of scheduling, as always, the scheduling of the order of play each day at the championships is a complex operation, and although we take great care when scheduling matches and allocating courts on a daily basis, it is not an exact science.

All decisions are made with fairness and the best interests of the tournament, players, spectators and our worldwide broadcast audience at heart, but the unpredictable nature of the length of matches and the British weather can and will cause disruption to any schedule."

Got it. Essentially the broadcast audience ( AELTC/BBC chasing numbers? or kinder, trying to spread tennis to more people? ) largely dictated a fairly unprecended unfair schecule, made worse but not caused by the British weather ( it was predicted to be unsettled ) and the length of the mens match.

kundalini · Specialist Reporter + Intermediate Club Player

PaulM wrote:
Hopefully she's ok, it was a lot to deal with and it would have all caught up with her after losing the set. If she'd won it she may have been able to keep digging and carry on. But very sad she couldn't even return to court.

But I don't think you can blame age, she's not even the youngest player in the final 16, but she was the most inexperienced, I think that's what has undone her here. The magnitude of what it takes to keep this up mentally and physically at this level. And the pressure. Hopefully she can grow from this, she's a phenomenal talent.

Emma's statement on twitter today would appear to support your analysis.

I'm not surprised she ran out of energy. It's a common scenario for players in their first year on tour and even established players making the 2nd week of a slam for the first time. Beforehand, I thought Emma would have enough energy for this match unless it was a tight 3 set contest but would be running low after that.

I was impressed that she kept holding serve until 4-5, despite struggling to find her form. Watching the match a 2nd time, you can see her saying "fight, fight" in between points, while she's serving. There's been plenty of criticism of Jodie on here for self-sabotage during matches. Emma was the complete opposite, playing badly yet using any positive minor event to fire herself up.

indiana · Tennis legend

It was surely emotional energy, not physical energy to last the match, that was apparently the issue??

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

indiana wrote:
It was surely emotional energy, not physical energy to last the match, that was apparently the issue??

Yes, I think the 'I wanted to win so badly....' comment was telling.

Peter too · Tennis legend

I hope they have done a very thorough medical check to make sure there is no fundamental problem. There have been a number of athletes who collapsed due to previously undiagnosed heart abnormalities for example.

I see Emma has the W60 in Spain down as her first choice next week.

indiana · Tennis legend

Undeniably a pretty decent looking SF line-up and even an interesting narrative - GAMOVER's stat ( from the rags to riches thread ) that every single women's singles final after 1963, other than Wade vs Stove in 1977, has contained a previous fnalist. Can Angie Kerber keep that going?

PaulM · Tennis legend

The world number 1, two former world number 1s, and the #2 seed. Pretty strong line-up and I'd say 3 of the 4 are names most casual UK/Wimbledon tennis watcher would know.

flamingowings · All-time great

In a way, it's a shame Emma's break out run happened at home. Much like Andy finally winning a slam, maybe if she had got to 4th round in USO or AO, may have helped. Hope she does ok post Wimbledon - both mentally and physically.

foobarbaz · Strong Club Player

flamingowings wrote:
In a way, it's a shame Emma's break out run happened at home. Much like Andy finally winning a slam, maybe if she had got to 4th round in USO or AO, may have helped. Hope she does ok post Wimbledon - both mentally and physically.

The interview by Sue Barker was impressive, she didn't dwell on the negative, and covered all the bases. It seems the signs are good. After the overall very good performance by the GB women (and men) this Wimbledon, I suspect that parents across the land are now having to find the cash to buy tennis racquets, etc. for their kids.

-- Edited by foobarbaz on Tuesday 6th of July 2021 10:24:47 PM

dodrade · Futures qualifying

foobarbaz wrote:
flamingowings wrote:
In a way, it's a shame Emma's break out run happened at home. Much like Andy finally winning a slam, maybe if she had got to 4th round in USO or AO, may have helped. Hope she does ok post Wimbledon - both mentally and physically.
The interview by Sue Barker was impressive, she didn't dwell on the negative, and covered all the bases. It seems the signs are good. After the overall very good performance by the GB women (and men) this Wimbledon, I suspect that parents across the land are now having to find the cash to buy tennis racquets, etc. for their kids.

-- Edited by foobarbaz on Tuesday 6th of July 2021 10:24:47 PM

She didn't criticise the AEC either regarding the scheduling when pressed by Sue, although as an 18 year old WC barely starting her career she probably wouldn't feel in a position to do so. Her statement is very on message compared to Murray and other more senior players who aren't afraid to have a go at the LTA.

Just glad no real harm has been done, an ITF tournament might well do her good to play out of the spotlight for a while.

-- Edited by dodrade on Wednesday 7th of July 2021 12:30:39 AM

RedSquirrel · Satellite level

The questions about how many instagram followers she now has were inappropriate to someone who has recently had a suspected panic attack and entirely unnecessary in any event, even if it did elicit a funny story from Emma. How to add more pressure on her. I thought she didn't seem particularly comfortable with being told she now had over quarter of a million followers. Why do we have to measure everything by how many instagram followers you have anyway? Tennis isn't a popularity contest. How many instagram followers you have doesn't get you to the top of the rankings or win you tournaments.

foobarbaz · Strong Club Player

RedSquirrel wrote:
The questions about how many instagram followers she now has were inappropriate to someone who has recently had a suspected panic attack and entirely unnecessary in any event, even if it did elicit a funny story from Emma. How to add more pressure on her. I thought she didn't seem particularly comfortable with being told she now had over quarter of a million followers. Why do we have to measure everything by how many instagram followers you have anyway? Tennis isn't a popularity contest. How many instagram followers you have doesn't get you to the top of the rankings or win you tournaments.

The "cause" is the independent variable. It's value is independent of the other factors. Whereas, the "effect" is the dependent variable whose value changes according to the independent variable's value.

"Tennis success" is the "cause", and "Instagram followers" is the "effect", and I would suggest it's probably quite a strong correlation. Therefore, the number of Instagram followers likely does provide an indication of how well a tennis player is performing.

RedSquirrel, I do share the sentiment, however. biggrin

dodrade · Futures qualifying

foobarbaz wrote:
RedSquirrel wrote:
The questions about how many instagram followers she now has were inappropriate to someone who has recently had a suspected panic attack and entirely unnecessary in any event, even if it did elicit a funny story from Emma. How to add more pressure on her. I thought she didn't seem particularly comfortable with being told she now had over quarter of a million followers. Why do we have to measure everything by how many instagram followers you have anyway? Tennis isn't a popularity contest. How many instagram followers you have doesn't get you to the top of the rankings or win you tournaments.
The "cause" is the independent variable. It's value is independent of the other factors. Whereas, the "effect" is the dependent variable whose value changes according to the independent variable's value.

"Tennis success" is the "cause", and "Instagram followers" is the "effect", and I would suggest it's probably quite a strong correlation. Therefore, the number of Instagram followers likely does provide an indication of how well a tennis player is performing.

How then does Eugenie Bouchard have over 2m?

christ · Futures level

dodrade wrote:
foobarbaz wrote:
RedSquirrel wrote:
The questions about how many instagram followers she now has were inappropriate to someone who has recently had a suspected panic attack and entirely unnecessary in any event, even if it did elicit a funny story from Emma. How to add more pressure on her. I thought she didn't seem particularly comfortable with being told she now had over quarter of a million followers. Why do we have to measure everything by how many instagram followers you have anyway? Tennis isn't a popularity contest. How many instagram followers you have doesn't get you to the top of the rankings or win you tournaments.
The "cause" is the independent variable. It's value is independent of the other factors. Whereas, the "effect" is the dependent variable whose value changes according to the independent variable's value.

"Tennis success" is the "cause", and "Instagram followers" is the "effect", and I would suggest it's probably quite a strong correlation. Therefore, the number of Instagram followers likely does provide an indication of how well a tennis player is performing.

How then does Eugenie Bouchard have over 2m?

"Tennis success" is not the only "cause".

In fact it is often difficult to isolate the main "cause". Sadly it does appear that in these woke times that cuteness is still a primary "cause", although "Tennis success" alerts folk to the cuteness. Good looking players - by and large - have bigger followings than their less attractive peers.