Tag: Wimbledon

LONDON: Defending Wimbledon champion Novak Djokovic became the first player to win 80 matches at all four Grand Slams on Monday while teenage star Carlos Alcaraz battled over five sets to make the second round.

Six-time champion and top seed Djokovic saw off South Korea’s Kwon Soo-woo 6-3, 3-6, 6-3, 6-4.

But 20-time Grand Slam winner Djokovic was made to work after falling a break down in the opening two sets against his 81st-ranked opponent — losing the second of those.

“Now we have got to 80 wins, let’s get to 100,” said Djokovic, who praised an opponent whose love of karaoke led to an appearance on the South Korean version of TV hit “The Masked Singer” last month.

Djokovic, 35, is attempting to win a fourth successive Wimbledon title and join a select group.

In the Open era, only Bjorn Borg, Pete Sampras and Roger Federer have managed such a streak at the All England Club.

Alcaraz, a potential quarter-final opponent for Djokovic, came back from two sets to one down to defeat Germany’s Jan-Lennard Struff.

The 19-year-old fired 30 aces and 73 winners in a dazzling display of shot-making to win 4-6, 7-5, 4-6, 7-6 (7/3), 6-4.

“Last year, I played five sets in the first round here as well so this shows how much I like grass,” joked Alcaraz.

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EASTBOURNE: Serena Williams’ Wimbledon preparations suffered a blow after doubles partner Ons Jabeur withdrew from the Eastbourne tournament because of a knee injury on Thursday.

Williams had returned to tennis at Eastbourne after 12 months away, playing her first two competitive matches since she limped out of last year’s Wimbledon in tears with a leg injury.

The 40-year-old American and Tunisian partner Jabeur made it through to the Eastbourne semi-finals with wins over Maria Bouzkova and Sara Sorribes Tormo in the last 16 and Shuko Aoyama and Chan Hao-ching in the quarter-finals.

But Jabeur’s injury deprives Serena of the chance to hone further her grass-court game ahead of the start of Wimbledon on Monday.

Before Williams made the surprise announcement of her return last week, rumours of retirement had swirled around her for several months.

But Williams has accepted a wild card into the women’s singles at Wimbledon as she bids to equal Margaret Court’s record of 24 Grand Slam singles titles.

She will find out who she faces in the first round when the draw is made on Friday.

Speaking after Wednesday’s doubles match, Williams had said: “I feel good. As good as one can feel after having such a long time off. I was telling Ons, that this was a really good match, and the second set in particular, they played really well, but we were able to just play under different circumstances.

“It was actually good match play and match practice, which is exactly what I needed and what I wanted to do coming here, so I couldn’t have asked for more.”

The last of Williams’ 23 Grand Slam singles titles came at the Australian Open in 2017.

Since then she has lost four Grand Slam finals, including at Wimbledon in 2018 and 2019.

Williams won the seventh and most recent of her seven Wimbledon singles titles in 2016.

Serena, who became a mother in 2017, has plummeted to 1,204th in the WTA rankings due to her period out of action prior to Eastbourne.

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LONDON: Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal headline the title chase at Wimbledon where eight-time champion Roger Federer, the world’s top two players and cherished ranking points will all be missing.

Djokovic is bidding for a seventh title at the All England Club to move level with US great Pete Sampras.

Nadal, fresh from a 14th French Open victory and a record-extending 22nd major, is halfway to the first men’s calendar Grand Slam in more than half a century.

The season’s third Slam tournament has already made political waves even before the first ball is served on Monday.

The decision to ban Russian and Belarusian players in the aftermath of the invasion of Ukraine means there is no place for world number one Daniil Medvedev or eighth-ranked Andrey Rublev.

Both the ATP and WTA, who control the men’s and women’s tours, retaliated by stripping ranking points from the tournament.

For the first time since his debut in 1999 — notwithstanding the Covid-cancelled 2020 edition — Federer will be a no-show as the 40-year-old recovers from knee surgery.

Also missing is Germany’s world number two Alexander Zverev, who suffered serious ankle ligament damage in a horrific injury in his French Open semi-final against Nadal.

However, Medvedev and Zverev have never shone at Wimbledon with neither man making it past the fourth round.

Djokovic and Nadal, ranked three and four, are the top seeds meaning if they are to face each other for the 60th time, it can only be in the final.

Djokovic, the champion in 2011, 2014, 2015, 2018, 2019, and 2021, could be playing in his final Slam of the year.

His refusal to be vaccinated is likely to rule him out of the US Open later this year.

A bruising quarter-final loss to Nadal at the French Open which saw him deposed as champion in Paris will also likely provide extra motivation.

Nadal won the last of his two Wimbledon titles in 2010 having captured his first with an epic triumph over Federer two years earlier.

The 36-year-old Spaniard arrives at Wimbledon with the Australian and French Opens secured.

He is halfway to becoming only the third man — and first since Rod Laver in 1969 — to complete a calendar Grand Slam.

Nadal has endured a bittersweet relationship with Wimbledon.

Two titles have been accompanied by three lost finals as well as injury-enforced absences in 2004, 2009, 2016, and 2021.

There remains a question mark over his durability for the two weeks at Wimbledon having played the entire French Open with his troublesome left foot anesthetized.

Nadal has since undergone a course of radiofrequency stimulation, a treatment aimed at reducing nerve pain in his foot.

“I love Wimbledon,” said Nadal. “I had a lot of success there. A player like me, I am always ready to play Wimbledon.”

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PALMA: Spanish tennis legend Rafael Nadal said on Friday he intends to play at Wimbledon but his final decision rests on how his troublesome left foot feels after training in London next week.

“My intention is to play at Wimbledon,” Nadal said at a press conference in Mallorca.

“The treatment and the last week of training tell me there is a chance. I will travel to London on Monday, play an exhibition at Hurlingham, and do a week of training to see if it’s possible.”

Nadal said injections meant his left foot felt “asleep” during the French Open final on June 5 — he still beat Casper Ruud to claim a record-extending 22nd Grand Slam title.

Nadal, who confirmed he was going to be a father for the first time, traveled to Barcelona last week to begin “pulsed radiofrequency stimulation”, a treatment aimed at reducing nerve pain.

Nadal’s spokesperson said the treatment would leave the nerves in his foot “temporarily numb”.

The 36-year-old then had his first session on the grass on Monday at the Mallorca Country Club in Santa Ponca and has steadily increased the intensity of his training this week.

“I have noticed a difference, some slightly strange feeling to be honest,” said Nadal.

“With the treatment in the nerves, things happen in your foot, sometimes one part of the foot goes numb, sometimes another.

“It’s normal apparently and after a few weeks, the nerves reorganize themselves.

“I’m happy. I’ve felt a bit of pain, but it’s different from what I had before, which for me is progress.”

Nadal has won Wimbledon twice in his career, in 2008 and 2010.

He missed last year’s tournament due to pain in the same left foot while the 2020 tournament was canceled due to the pandemic, meaning Nadal is hoping to make his first appearance at the All England Club in three years.

“I will travel to London, play two matches there before the tournament and follow my normal schedule to prepare for Wimbledon,” Nadal said.

“Who knows what can happen in a couple of days — if the situation changes or something more negative (happens), there will be a moment to explain.

“But I am excited to travel to Wimbledon and to play for the first time in three years.”

He said his plan is to “play Wimbledon, rest, then Canada and then the US Open.”

Nadal’s career results have been, relatively, less consistent at Wimbledon, and he admits his lack of match practice on grass could leave him vulnerable in this year’s early rounds.

“Playing well at Roland Garros helps the confidence level but the grass is a different surface and there is little logic to these things,” the world number four said.

“I haven’t played on grass for three years and it will be difficult. The first rounds will be crucial – if you get through them, the opponents are more difficult, but you also play with more rhythm.

“The first matches you play, against people with recent experience on these courts, are a bit of a lottery.”

He then turned to personal matters, saying: “If all goes well, I’m going to be a father.

“I’m not used to talking about my personal life, I prefer to keep a low profile for tranquility. I don’t anticipate this to mean a change in my professional life,” Nadal said.

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LONDON: Serena Williams will return to Grand Slam tennis for the first time in a year at Wimbledon later this month after being handed a wildcard entry by the All England Club on Tuesday.

The seven-time Wimbledon singles champion has not played since suffering an injury in her first-round match at the tournament in London 12 months ago.

Williams, 40, will make her competitive return next week in the doubles competition alongside Tunisia’s Ons Jabeur at the Eastbourne grasscourt tournament.

“I am excited to return to the Rothesay International Eastbourne in England and to be back on the grass — a surface that has been so good to me throughout my career,” said Williams.

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