Wimbledon — the greatest sports competition on Earth

I arrived at Wimbledon shortly after 11am. There it was again, the 13.5-acre oasis of pastured perfection. Yet as soon as I set eyes on it, I was sent the other way. Up a hill. To the tail of a very long snake of people. 

Apparently the gates hadn’t been opened on time. Hundreds of ticket-holders ended up walking more than a mile, in a circle. Inside, the tennis started without us. Many certainties have been shaken by the pandemic but had the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club really forgotten how to organise a queue? 

So, yes, the return of Wimbledon had a few slips. The most consequential ones were literal: Serena Williams, Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray all crashed to the grass, undone by the damp surface. “It’s so dangerous,” grumbled Murray. But neither he nor Williams, whose fall ended her participation, nor indeed anyone else, complained much. “I don’t mind falling more if the result is winning a match,” said Djokovic. 

Whether you’re queueing outside or slipping on court, you can’t stay mad at Wimbledon for long. To me, the tennis tournament is the greatest sports competition on Earth. Even more than football’s European championship, it makes me proud to be English. It is national tradition with international talent. It is exclusive but accessible. It is passionate but only occasionally tribal. It is successful but rarely commercial (and, yes, I know the official towels cost £35). 

You can lament the flaws of England’s ruling classes — their failure to plan for Brexit and Covid, their inability to break the straitjacket of history — or you can come to SW19 and delight in a microcosm where those flaws are not decisive. 

Wimbledon represents an England that just works. We have other institutions: the monarchy, Westminster, the Underground. None runs nearly as smoothly as the Championships. There’s the discipline of the ball boys and girls, the efficiency of the ground teams, the politeness of the honorary stewards. There’s the umpires’ ability to hush a crowd simply by saying “thank you”. There’s the fact that the strawberries are picked on the same day they are eaten.

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Once upon a time, Wimbledon was used as an analogy for Britain’s economic strengths, notably the City — you could host the best players from around the world, even if none of them belonged to you. Last year it became a model for another reason. The club revealed it had been paying pandemic insurance since the 2003 Sars outbreak. The insurance had cost £26m over 17 years, and yielded a £174m payout when the tournament had to be cancelled. Every other organisation wished it had been as prescient. 

Even so, the pandemic marked the first time since 1877 that the tournament had not happened, outside of world wars. Tennis had to return in 2021, not least because Williams, Murray and Roger Federer were not getting any younger. 

Officially Wimbledon is not going ahead as normal: it is a pilot gathering in the government’s Events Research Programme. This means some brave volunteers have to drink Pimm’s in the name of scientific research. I managed to pluck up the courage.

Capacity started on Monday at just 50 per cent, and will gradually increase until the finals weekend, when 15,000 spectators will be allowed in Centre Court. It will be the first Grand Slam since the start of the pandemic to play at full capacity; it may also be the last Slam to be disrupted by coronavirus.

Federer, Williams and Murray were more like whales running aground, while concerned onlookers willed them to safety

Normally tickets for Wimbledon are as hit-and-miss as Murray’s youthful drop shots. This year there was no advance ballot for tickets (the 2020 ballot has been rolled over to 2022), and no on-the-day queue for tickets, because of social distancing. This meant lots of seats were available online to those who remembered to register. A friend just clicked on “Sunday July 11” and got men’s finals tickets. Where’s the fun in that? I suggested he at least camp in his garden for a night to feel like he’d earned them. 

Spectators have to show proof of two vaccinations or a recent negative test. But, thankfully, Covid protocols are not a big part of the experience. If anything, the reduced capacity makes things rather pleasant. The mask-wearing is, ahem, sporadic. On the first day, Centre Court began with a standing ovation for Sarah Gilbert, co-creator of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine. 

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The tennis story is one of ageing champions. Rafael Nadal, who despite being best on clay always saw winning on grass as his bigger achievement, is absent through injury. Several others, however, wanted to add one last episode to arguably tennis’s greatest era. Williams won her first singles title in 2002 (before the invasion of Iraq), Federer in 2003 (before José Mourinho had ever managed in English football). They came again. 

As someone approaching 40 myself, I would love to report that the old-timers rolled back the years. More often, they rolled back their eyes and knees and ankles. Federer — the man, the Adonis — hasn’t lost in the first round since 2002. He was only spared that indignity this time when his opponent withdrew from injury after a fall. Williams lasted barely five games, until a slip ruined her hamstring. She tried to keep playing, almost immobile on the baseline, her serve reduced to a mere 91mph. It was painful to watch. 

Even Djokovic looked vulnerable, losing his first set in the Championships to a British player, Jack Draper, who got barely half his first serves in. Murray, on a remarkable comeback from hip surgery, needed five sets — and countless verbal outbursts — to beat the world number 151, Oscar Otte, on Wednesday night.

The big players normally go through the first few rounds like whales feeding on krill. Federer, Williams and Murray were more like whales running aground, while concerned onlookers willed them to safety. 

Wimbledon evolves. It pushed out the one-dimensional big servers by reducing the pressure of the balls. It dealt with the weather, through roofs on Centre Court and No. 1 Court. It adapted to the era of TV fandom, with the big screen on Henman Hill. Technology, in the form of VAR, complicates the joy of football, but tennis’s Hawk-Eye challenges add to the fun. 

But how will the tournament swallow the loss of Federer, Williams, her sister Venus, and more? With difficulty. Tennis has few known personalities. One of them is Nick Kyrgios, the mercurial 6ft 4in Australian, who was playing for the first time since the Australian Open. Kyrgios talks to himself (“great serve, Nick, great serve!”), to his opponent (“too good, well played”), and to the umpire. Most of the time, he’s really talking to the crowd. 

“Guys, for you watching at home, it should be fast in here,” he said, during one changeover. “It should be fast — that’s grass court tennis. They’ve made it slow. This isn’t grass any more . . . Start watering it . . . Make it a grass court again, will you please? Thanks.”

It helps that Kyrgios has the game to back up his talk but, in truth, the crowd is easily impressed. If only more players realised that no flicker of personality goes unrewarded. “I like grass, I love England, I like English people,” Williams’s opponent, Aliaksandra Sasnovich, who almost no one wanted to win, said in her post-match interview. “I’ll try to make you happy!” She was cheered off. 

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Crowds make sport — we know that after months of empty stadiums. But, selfishly, what do you gain from watching sport in person? In an age of staying at home, the question has to be asked. Sat on your sofa, you’ll probably have a better view. You get fine-grain detail from a high-definition TV. You can channel-hop to the best match of the day.

But going to Wimbledon is always worth it. Every time I’m there, I am reminded not how big the stage is, but how small. A tennis court is just a tennis court. It doesn’t get any bigger, whoever’s playing. On the outside courts at Wimbledon, the players are surrounded by bustle and noise that would cause amateur club players to demand a let. Often no one is cheering them on, except their coach; sometimes not even the coach is there. 

Lose in the first round of the singles, and you get £48,000 in prize money (enough to buy 1,371 official towels). It’s a job. But these players were the best in their class, their town, often their entire country. It’s a dream. They arrive hoping that they might break into the elite, that all those lonely practice sessions were worth it. 

Every summer that there is a World Cup or a European Championship, Wimbledon struggles for relevance. There’s no competing with football. About 10m UK viewers watched Djokovic beat Federer in the 2019 final; more than 27m watched England beat Germany on Tuesday. I confess I sneaked out of Centre Court to watch that game on a stranger’s iPad.

Wimbledon is not perfect. The hierarchies of members, debenture holders and Royal Box don’t sit well with everyone. The crowds are very white. The flowers are very vanilla. But after the past 18 months, can we not just savour the good bits?

In a pause in play, a steward asked my wife how bad the queue had been. She shrugged, and said it was out of his control. He paused, and replied: “Oh no, we do try to control everything.” They really do. And, by and large, they succeed. 

Henry Mance is the FT’s chief features writer

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