Isner and Kyrgios (ESPN Images)
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On this day of the Wimbledon singles draws, there’s as much going on off the court as there is on.
Which is a lot.
Canadian Leylah Fernandez is already in the Eastbourne final.
Cana-Chilean Alejandro Tabilo is trying to do the same in Mallorca gainst Gaël Monfils.
The Cana-Kiwis Dabrowski and Routliffe are into the Eastbourne doubles final.
And the sun is shining.
Here are the skeds for the men and woman on Friday.
Links to the men’s and women’s singles draw analyses are at the bottom of the post.
As always, thanks for reading, and clicking on a few ads to show your appreciation!
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Duckworth the first lucky loser
Right after the draw was made, France’s Corentin Moutet withdrew from Wimbledon, citing a bone bruise in his wrist.
Hello everyone,
— Corentin Moutet (@moutet99) June 28, 2024
Since my preparation for Roland Garros, I have been dealing with a bone bruise injury
Despite trying everything possible to heal and be ready for Wimbledon, the pain persists
After careful consideration with my team and doctor, we have made the difficult…
Moutet will be a first-time Olympian, at home, next month, so it’s particularly key for him to be as healthy as he can. That the draw ended up with his name next to that of No. 9 seed Alex de Minaur, of course, was a bad outcome if he’s not 100 per cent.
But there is, of course, a strategic component to withdrawing this late, at least for the players who don’t already bank millions.
Since Wimbledon 2017, when there were seven retirements in the first round (including the opponents of Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic), the Grand Slams have allowed players who withdraw onsite from the previous Tuesday, but before the main draw begins, to collect half the prize money.
In this case, that’s £30,000 – or nearly $38,000 US /$52,000 CAD
They also must have competed in a tournament in the 21 days preceding the start of main draw play, which Moutet did in playing Halle.
They also instituted fines for players who go out and fail, in their estimation, to be fit to play or give their best effort.
That avoids the scenario where players go out, play a few games, retire – and collect the entirety of the first-round purse.
The lucky loser gets whatever prize money they earn – minus the 50% of the first-round purse paid out to the player who withdrew
After the qualifying is done, the tournament takes at least the four highest-ranked final-round losers (not necessarily the highest seeds) and draws them at random, to fill in where those withdrawals occur.
That avoids players tanking a final-round match as a top qualifying seed when they know someone is going to withdraw, or already has.
In this draw, it was No. 4 seed James Duckworth who came up aces. He’ll replace Moutet in the draw and will play countryman Alex de Minaur.
The three other top-ranked players who would be in the mix are No. 1 seed Giovanni Mpetschi Perricard (No. 59), No. 6 Luca Van Assche (who was the first alternate into the main draw and, had a player like Moutet withdrawn four days ago, would have been straight in – No. 101) and No. 9 David Goffin (No. 82).
Duckworth is currently ranked No. 78; all of those players, had they been able to get their rankings up in time for the Wimbledon entry deadline, would have been in the main draw directly. As it was, they were a little too late, had to play the qualifying, and lost in the final round.
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ESPN invites Isner and Kyrgios to Wimbledon
The news that former WImbledon finalist Nick Kyrgios would be part of ESPN’s coverage for the entire fortnight was announced a while ago.
But ESPN has added American John Isner to their majoritarily male crew for the first week of the tournament.
They’re described in the press release as “two giants of the game”. Which of course means they’re both quite tall.
You already know there’s going to be a fluffy feature where Isner steps on Court 18 once again, the site of his marathon match with France’s Nicolas Mahut all the way back in 2010. You’d think Mahut, who is the doubles draw with Skander Mansouri of Tunisia, might need some persuading to revisit. But he’s always been a pretty good sport about the most famous loss of his career.
Kyrgios has played just one match in nearly two years – a first-round loss at Stuttgart a little over a year ago.
The 29-year-old also joined ESPN at the Australian Open. The network doesn’t have the rights to Roland Garros and no longer broadcasts the Masters 1000s, so they’re back in the thick of it for the first time in nearly six months.
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Berlin Open management bows out
The timing is curious, after this year’s edition of the women’s Berlin Open 500 tournament was plagued by rain and other issues but still was very well-attended.
But it wasn’t a sudden decision. The e|motion group had an opening after five years to give up its mandate to run the tournament, whose license is owned by … Wimbledon. And they took it; e|motion founter and CEO Edwin Weindorfer said he was withdrawing for “personal reasons”, reasons on which he did not elaborate.
The press releases on the topic state that there is … no replacement in sight. Tournament director Barbara Rittner doesn’t even know if she’ll have a job next year.
E|motion runs a bunch of other tournaments – Vienna, Stuttgart and the grass-court tournament in Mallorca. All happen to be men’s tournaments. They’re also involved in this year’s edition of the Laver Cup, which will be held in Berlin.
Weindorfer was front and centre in Berlin last week, including making quite a lengthy speech at the trophy ceremony.
And he made the quick pivot to Mallorca, where he made a speech as the tournament honoured the retiring ATP star Dominic Thiem earlier this week.
There is no talk of the event moving.
All 10 WTA top-10 players were originally entered in the tournament, with Roland Garros champion Iga Swiatek and finalist Jasmine Paolini eventually bowing out with fatigue.
There were other withdrawals and retirements, too. But the field was strong. And beginning in 2025, when its direct competitor Eastbourne is downgraded to a 250-level tournament, it will be even easier to attract top-30 players.
The rules on top-30 players competing at a 250-level tournament when there’s a 500 the same week are … SERIOUSLY restrictive.
Some media reports have a company called Perfect Match, owned by the Swiss Markus Günthardt and which runs the WTA’s successful indoor event in Stuttgart, as the likely successor. Perfect Match also runs this week’s Bad Homburg tournament.
It’s hard to discern through the language barrier, but Weindorfer reportly wanted the region’s government to kick in a bigger share of the tournament’s €4.5 million budget – some 20 per cent of it. Which it reportedly was not willing to do.
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ATP approves in-match wearables
It’s probably a long overdue move. But the ATP will allow, as of July 15, its players to sport wearable devices during matches on the main and Challenger Tours.
The devices will give player teams data on things like heart rate and high-intensity load data, with the goal of helping with preparation and recovery.
They’ve approved two types of devices: STATSports and Catapult. And they will centralize all the data onto a dashboard for the players. Later this year, they’ll add a “next generation” analysis component.
But these certainly are some interesting points brought up by Canadian Vasek Pospisil, who leads the (still-nascent) PTPA.
Lots of questions on this before anyone starts jumping for joy. Already had several discussions with folks here at Wimbledon and abroad. If this is a win for players…
— Vasek Pospisil (@VasekPospisil) June 28, 2024
1.Why can’t we use our own devices and keep our data for private use only?
2. Tennis players are supposedly… https://t.co/e4RNsA990r
Also – only two types of devices are approved. Are there many more than that? And if so, why those two and who benefits?
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Confusion on the “neutral” Olympic team
The International Olympic Committee has been releasing the names of athletes from Russia and Belarus that it deems “eligible” to compete as neutral athletes at next month’s Olympics.
They’ve “approved” eight spots for Russians, and two for Belarusians.
- Daniil MEDVEDEV
- Andrey RUBLEV
- Karen KACHANOV (sic)
- Roman SAFIULLIN
- Daria KASATKINA
- Liudmila SAMSONOVA
- Ekaterina ALEKSANDROVA
- Mirra ANDREEVA
- Aryna SABALENKA (BLR)
- Victoria AZARENKA (BLR)
Here’s the problem, though. The fact that these players have been deemed eligible is hardly a confirmation that they will take part.
Indeed, Sabalenka has already said she won’t play.
Russian Tennis Federation emperor Shamil Tarpischev told TASS nearly two weeks ago that Rublev, Khachanov and Samsonova also will pass on the Games.
For Rublev, Tarpischev indicated the beleaguered Russian No. 1 needed a break. He didn’t elaborate on the other two.
There is nothing yet on the Russian Tennis Federation or the ITF Olympic sites laying out who will play.
Khachanov has been confirmed as entered in the Citi Open in Washington, D.C., which takes place the same week. So is Daria Kasatkina.
And there’s no mention of other Russians who might well be eligible, as the country can send four male and four female singles players.
Those include Pavel Kotov (ranked No. 50) and Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova (No. 25), Veronika Kudermetova (No. 36), Anastasia Potapova (No. 39), Diana Shnaider (No. 47), Anna Blinkova (No. 66) and perhaps even Elina Avanesyan (No. 74 at the deadline).
Whether some don’t want to compete as neutrals, or were deemed “ineligible” for some unknown reason, is just part of why this whole thing is such a hot mess – regardless of whether you think the athletes from those two countries should be at the Olympics at all.
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Ukrainian Olympic (partial) nudity
To celebrate the announcement of the Ukrainians preparing to compete at the Olympics, that country’s edition of Vogue magazine decided on … racy, partially nude pics.
I mean, hey, it’s a choice!
Front and centre is a cheeky shot of Ukraine’s top player, Marta Kostyuk.
🤍 Tennis player Marta Kostyuk in the Vogue Ukraine magazine photoshoot of the 🇺🇦 Olympic & Paralympic Team
— Ukrainian Tennis • BTU (@ukrtennis_eng) June 25, 2024
📷: Jan Wasiuchnik / Vogue Ukraine pic.twitter.com/JccegNMX4U
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