Chapter 1498 Excellent Tradition

The All England Club, a small private club located in the western suburbs of London, shoulders the important task of hosting the annual Wimbledon tennis championships, and has stubbornly and tenaciously adhered to the tradition of modern tennis for more than a hundred years.

Sometimes, people accuse the All England Club of being too conservative and backward, not flexible, unable to keep up with the times, and even hurting the promotion of tennis—

In fact, not just once, but many, many times.

But the All England Club is still sticking to their principles, they are willing to change, but a little slower, they are willing to improve, but a little later; no matter what, they always show the tradition of tennis to modern young people with their own attitude, that is, a century What it looked like before tennis was born.

This deserves applause.

Grass is just the most fundamental of the many traditions at the All England Club.

First, the jersey.

Green and purple are the traditional representative colors of Wimbledon, and the referees and staff are all uniformed in uniform, continuing the tradition of a century ago.

At the same time, participating players must wear white jerseys, which is the only event that stipulates the color of players' clothing in all tennis events throughout the year.

"White clothes are better than snow, green grass", this seems to have become the most beautiful scenery in Wimbledon every year, and even a symbolic picture.

The whole body of the players must be white, and there are strict requirements from the headband to the soles of the shoes. Not only that, the All England Club also stipulates that the sports underwear that the players may expose during the game must also be white, and all details are strictly required to the centimeter range , all of which are expressly stipulated.

In 2013, Federer was once discovered by the referee because the soles of his custom-made Nike sneakers were orange-red, and he was asked to change his sneakers during the game, otherwise the game would not be able to continue, so that the Swiss king bluntly said after the game Strongly protest:

"I like Wimbledon, but these strict rules are a bit harsh, and some of the requirements can even be said to be absurd."

In addition, Bouchard was found to have black underwear during the game, which led to the suspension of the game; Kyrgios was asked to change the headband because the Wimbledon logo on the headband exceeded one centimeter, otherwise he would be disqualified from the game; Kournikova, who wore black tights and a white jersey, was turned away and would not be allowed to play without a change of shorts.

Ridiculous?

But it did happen, and more than once.

With the penetration of commercialization and the strong personalization of players, some adjustments have been made to this regulation. The All England Club accepts sleeveless shirts for male players and shorts for female players. Incorporate colorful elements, but only if the width is within one centimeter.

The only exception to the century-old All England Club was the 2016 London Olympics, when players were allowed not to wear white and to appear in the colors of the national team.

Of course, some people are curious, why?

Is it just because white and green look better together?

Looking back at history, we can find that this move is actually to respect the British royal family.

In the early years, the Queen liked Wimbledon very much and would come to watch the game every year. Later, it evolved into a tradition. The royal box was kept in the central court. Members of the royal family may come to watch the game every year. .

To show respect, the All England Club has a set of rules:

The white jersey is one of them, but unexpectedly, it has been continued. Regardless of whether the queen is present, the white jersey has also become the standard match; this rule was relaxed in the 1990s, and the requirements were not so strict. A century later it became strict again.

In addition, when players land on the center court to play, they must pay attention to the royal box before the game, regardless of whether there are people in the box, but later this rule was considered too pedantic and inflexible. There is no need to perform the attention ceremony.

In addition, a series of attention to detail has also been formulated in terms of titles, which are different from the "men/women" titles of the other three Grand Slams. Here, they must be called "gentlemen/ladies"; at the same time, the referee is broadcasting the score. Or you must use honorific titles when you have a conversation, and add a prefix in front of the surname, such as "Miss/Mrs" and "Mr", which are not available in the other three major slams.

Second, seed ranking.

For the other three Grand Slams, the seed seats are all determined according to the world rankings at the registration deadline. The number one in the world is the No. 1 seed, which is concise and clear; but this is not the case for Wimbledon.

Because the All England Club is a private club, they believe that they are different from official organizations such as ATP and WTA, so they do not need to determine the seed ranking completely according to the world ranking.

Since 2001, the All England Club has set up a special committee to refer to the grass performance of the players in the past few years, and then list the seed seats according to their world rankings.

The Committee has published this special calculation formula, based on the world ranking points at the Wimbledon entry deadline, plus the points from all grass court events in the past twelve months, and the best in the next twelve months. 75% of the grass-court event points.

In this regard, the All England Club stated that the grass season is getting shorter and more precious. They hope to encourage players to actively participate in this way, and improve their seed rankings in Wimbledon in a short period of time through their performance in different competitions. A good lottery; for grass court organizers, it will attract more top players to participate and help the event to run smoothly.

It's a win-win.

The results are obvious to all. Events including the Queen's Club, Halle, and Stuttgart have all received more attention from players. The most intuitive one is 's-Hertogenbosch. This small Dutch town has almost no special public relations promotion, but because Wimbledon's seed ranking method, every year, the top 30 players in the world go to participate ~lightnovelpub.net~ to ensure that the event can continue to be held.

It is precisely because of this that the announcement of Wimbledon's seed seats every year is also a major attraction—

Even professional tennis reporters are often too lazy to calculate the points and list the rankings through the formula. They all wait for the committee of the All England Club to announce the seed rankings, and then arouse amazement. Every year, the seed seats are more or less controversial, with some agreeing and some opposing There are also plays.

But it is undeniable that those grassland masters really benefited from this special rule.

In 2010, before the deadline for Wimbledon registration, Nadal surpassed Federer to become the world's number one, but when he came to the All England Club, Federer was still the number one seed.

In 2011, Serena Williams, who fell to 26th in the world ranking due to injury, went to Wimbledon as the seventh seed.

For legends like Federer and Serena Williams, such seed ranking rules are a kind of respect, but for other players who are trying to improve their world rankings, it may not be so fair. Bourdain's seed ranking will attract controversy —

However, the All England Club is still going its own way.

(end of this chapter)