Canada's Milos Raonic returns to Tommy Paul of the US in a men's singles match on day four of the Wimbledon tennis championships in London, on July 6.Alberto Pezzali/The Associated Press
The other day, Milos Raonic was asked what tradition or ritual in tennis he would change if he could.
Raonic seems different since returning from his years in the wilderness. Less tightly wound. More forthcoming. The old Raonic would have slapped the question away. New Raonic just shot off the top of his head.
“‘Followed by’ matches,” the Canadian said. “I think it would change the average fans’ experience if they knew when a match started. And when, if they were excited for a match, when that would be on TV. Not with this ‘followed by’ stuff.”
Right? Seriously – what’s with ‘followed by’ in tennis?
This is the process at a big tournament in which most matches are followed by another, especially in the early going. So if Match 1 starts at 11 a.m., it is followed by Match 2, which might start at 1 p.m. Or 3. Or if Match 1 turns into a five-set all-timer, at 5.
How many fewer people would watch baseball if the Jays played some time after the Cubs’ game ended? ‘Coming up – the Cubs, followed by Toronto versus New York. We’ll get that second one started before midnight. Fingers crossed.’
There’s no fixing it altogether, but there is a way to make things better – start earlier. More available work hours in the day equals more certainty.
But morning starts are bad for TV audiences, which is bad for advertisers, which is bad for business. So the pain is passed on to players.
It would be one thing – still not a great thing, but a different thing – if that pain was spread around equally. But it isn’t. The lower you are on the greasy tennis pole, the more likely you are to get jobbed by ‘followed by.’
At this year’s Wimbledon, Canada’s Bianca Andreescu has been caught in that scheduling wood chipper.
Andreescu was scheduled to begin her tournament on Tuesday. She didn’t exactly get a prime-time spot – fifth match on Court 16. If the weather had been perfect, that would still have been a tough ask. The weather wasn’t perfect.
So after showing up and hanging around for hours, Andreescu was told to come back to try again on Wednesday. She was scheduled for the fifth match again, this time on Court 14.
More rain. That didn’t happen either.
The obvious thing would have been to schedule her first on whatever court for Thursday. That also didn’t happen. Andreescu and her Hungarian opponent, Anna Bondar, were given the second slot on Court 17.
On Thursday morning, world No. 1 Iga Swiatek, who plays under a roof on Centre Court or Court 1 with the cool kids, advanced to her third-round match.
Hours later, Andreescu, world No. 50, who plays out in the open with the rest of the WTA’s plebs, started her first-round match.
“It’s definitely very frustrating having to wait around. … That’s life for many of us,” Andreescu said. And that was after winning her match. It would be a lot more frustrating had she lost.
“I’m trying to control the controllables,” Andreescu said. “And those things I can’t control [shrug] until I’m seeded again.”
She gets it. Even at this level, the players exists in two worlds – haves (rankings) and haves not. By design, only one of them is conducive to winning majors.
If the seeds versus non-seeds is one dividing line, so is the young versus the aged.
The budding star of this tournament is Franco-Russian 16-year-old, Mirra Andreeva. You know how some people have that thing? That thing that’s hard to define that gets people interested? Andreeva has so much of it, she must make the sound of a cash register as she passes. If she is anywhere near as good as people say she will be, she’s going to be bigger than the Beatles.
But Andreeva is still 102nd-ranked in the world, meaning she also got put through the weather wringer. Her first-round match was played late Wednesday evening. Her second-round match began about 12 hours later. Andreeva ground her way through the first, and romped in the second.
“Today, I can say I feel fresh,” Andreeva said later, and then – “I feel tired. But that’s okay. I feel tired almost every day.”
Ah, youth.
Meanwhile, Raonic was over on Court 4-hundred-and-something proving his own point.
Playing ranked American Tommy Paul was always going to be a big ask for a man who is returning after a years-long absence. But playing Tommy Paul less than a day after his previous match was like asking Raonic to turn water to wine. Some miracles are too much to ask.
Halfway through the first set, Raonic was laid out on the deck while a physio worked on his shoulder. He muscled his way through the rest of the match. He even looked like he was fully in it at times. But it was never in any doubt. Raonic went down in four sets.
So how are things looking for Canada? Better than you feared, and not as good as you hoped.
Leylah Fernandez was a third-set tiebreak from upsetting world No. 5 Caroline Garcia. Though she lost on Thursday, Fernandez, 20, kind of, sort of resembled the player she was when she made a U.S. Open final in 2021.
The most hopeful development is Denis Shapovalov. Several good things happened for him on Thursday.
First, he won his second-round match.
Second, the guy you assumed he’d be playing in the third round, French Open finalist Casper Ruud, lost.
Third, the guy who beat Ruud, Liam Broady, did so in a five-set comeback. Afterward, Broady, a Brit, said, “I said to my mom this morning – she doesn’t like watching – I said, ‘Look, I’ve already won 80 grand this week so you can chill out.’”
Not exactly the eye of the tiger, is it?
And lastly, because of the goofy scheduling, Shapovalov and Broady will play Friday.
Is that fair?
Ask Shapovalov if he wins.