With Wimbledon less than a week away, I’ll address three questions that might be on your mind.
What’s wrong with Wimbledon’s seeding system?
It treats men and women unequally. Wimbledon held out on equal prize money for years, but few have remarked on the fact that the tournament doesn’t seed men and women the same way. Here’s how Wimbledon describes its methods on its own web site.
Men: “A seeding Committee is not required for the Gentlemen’s Singles since the seeding order is determined using an objective and transparent system to reflect more accurately an individual player’s grass court achievements: The formula is:
• Take [ranking] points at 16 June 2008
• Add 100% points earned for all grass court tournament in the past 12 months
• Add 75% points earned for best grass court tournament in the 12 months before that.”
Women: “The seeding order will follow the ranking list, except where in the opinion of the Committee, the grass court credentials of a particular player necessitates a change in the interest of achieving a balanced draw.”
There you have it: for the men, Wimbledon has devised an “objective and transparent” system. For the women, it gathers together a committee, puts them in a back room, pours tea, passes out cigarettes, and let’s them debate, in private, about whether any of the women deserve extra credit for their grass court prowess. Seems reasonable, doesn’t it?
The committee, it seems, didn’t think much of Venus Williams, who won the tournament last year and two years before that. The defending champion is seeded 7th, behind her sister Serena (no. 6), no. 5 Elena Dementieva (one-time quarterfinalist, three-time first-round loser), and no. 4 Svetlana Kuznetsova (three-time quarterfinalist, including last year, when Venus beat her in straight sets).
If Wimbledon used a formula for the women, as it does for the men, no one could argue (as I’m doing now) that the seeding committee slighted Venus by not bumping her up to no. 4, where, to my mind, she belongs (Andy Roddick, no. 6 in the men’s draw, deserves the fourth seed more than two men in front of him—Nikolay Davydenko and David Ferrer—but the formula didn’t work in his favor, so that’s that). Why not use the same formula to avoid questioning?
The tournament should realize something else, too: It makes more sense to rearrange the seeds (on grass) among the women these days than the men. The tournament traditionally finagles with the men’s seeding more than it does the women’s, but in the men’s game these days, the three players with the best chances to win any tournament—including Wimbledon—are the top three men in the world. Does anyone give the other 125 guys much of a chance at this tournament? There’s a more compelling case to rearrange the seeds in the women’s draw than the men’s draw, yet the tournament didn’t make a single change to the women’s draw. Not even Marion Bartoli, last year’s finalist, was given any love. It’s confounding.
Wimbledon should either use the same formula for both men and women, use a committee for both men and women, or perhaps best of all, just stick to the rankings on both sides like every other major does. The tournament’s current practice makes no sense.
Why is Rafael Nadal so good on grass?
Nadal won his first grass court tournament last weekend, dispatching Andy Roddick and Novak Djokovic on consecutive days (both in straight sets). I thought Nadal was the better player for most of last year’s final against Roger Federer; last week, he looked better than that. In years past, I wouldn’t have been surprised to see Nadal lose at Wimbledon in an early round (don’t forget that he needed five sets to beat Robert Kendrick, Robin Soderling, and Mikhail Youzhny in the last two years). This year, I’d be mighty surprised. Someone like Ivo Karlovic, Radek Stepanek, Youzhny, or Soderling could upset Nadal, but it’s going to be more difficult this year. Here are four reasons why.
1. Footwork/balance. A subtle thing I noticed in the Queens Club final between Nadal and Djokovic: Nadal doesn’t lose control of his body. Djokovic is the sliding kind—heck, he routinely slides on hard courts. On clay, Nadal limits his sliding to where it’s necessary and even then he doesn’t take long ones. In London last weekend, Djokovic lost his footing a lot and gave Nadal time to hit forehands into an open court. Nadal rarely lost his (I can remember one time). He takes very small steps and controls his weight perfectly as he moves into, and out of, his shots. His superior footwork gives him more chances to win points.
2. His serve. Nadal uses his wide, slice serve much more often, and much more effectively, these days. When he hits it well, he moves his opponent off the court and has plenty of room for a winning forehand.
3. Misdirection. Another reason why Djokovic seemed to slip and slide so much in the final: He couldn’t tell which way Nadal was going to hit the ball. Nadal seems more capable today of hiding his intentions. Mostly, he hits forehands crosscourt to his opponent’s backhand, but when he does hit one inside out, it’s not clear until the ball is already on its way. He seems to hold the ball, and puts enough sidespin on the down the line forehand (it curves into the court) to make you wonder whether he ought to take up billiards when he retires.
4. His backhand. I’ve always thought Nadal had a better backhand than he was given credit for. It doesn’t look pretty (for that matter, neither does the rest of his game), but it’s now a certifiable weapon. From an open stance he can hit the ball in either direction, and it’s always low, hard, and spinning. Djokovic never seemed to have an easy look at a volley.
Was that Clay? Again?
Nikolay Davydenko won a tournament last week. In Poland. On Clay. Clay! The ATP Tour has many problems in terms of scheduling, the intensity of the season, lawsuits (see Hamburg Masters), and leadership concerns (Etienne DeVilliers, the ATP’s CEO, is not a popular man among top players these days), but sanctioning a clay tournament the week after the French Open, when the grass season is a mere four weeks long (including Wimbledon), is ridiculous. The folks in Warsaw can keep their tournament, but if I were king of the ATP for a day, this would be my first decree: Any player inside the top 100 who plays on clay between the French Open and Wimbledon receives no ranking points. Top 25 players who fall into this category (that means you, Tommy Robredo!) are summarily docked 500 points.
Tom Perrotta is a senior editor at Tennis magazine.