I'll admit that tennis bores me anyway, but surely the epic match between John Isner and Nicolas Mahut set to resume at Wimbledon today at 59-59 in the final set, and already the longest professional match ever, is a clear sign of how dull the men's game, at least, has become. Fast powerful serves from players well over 6 ft. tall now dominate, to the extent that an ace, far from being the oddity it used to be, is now commonplace.
Top players like Federer or Nadal may have the skill to break the serves of these hard hitters, but when you get two lower-ranked players, as here, who can bang in those fast serves like machines but don't have the class to break opponents' serves, you get dreary endless matches like this. The server's advantage becomes overwhelming; unstoppable. Expect a lot more of these games, unless they introduce some kind of final set tie-break.
And that is all I have to say about tennis.
I agree (I used to agree more but I went to see a pro game and it is very different in the flesh), but it is easily cured, surely. Simply get rid of the second serve. It would immedialtely reduce the premium on the power server and improve the game. I wish they would get on with it.
Other easy rules to solve apparently intractable sports problems:make it an offence in football for anybopdy to approach or talk to the referee except for the team captain. Instant removal of all that annoying (and sometimes worse) mobbing of refs.
Posted by: John Meredith | June 24, 2010 at 10:04 AM