!Venus By Rosangel Valenti, TW Contributing Editor
Good morning. As usual, this post provides your daily space for talking about the tennis taking place at the All-England Club in Wimbledon, or for match-calling. Given the large nunber of comment entries that these posts attract, we'd be grateful if you could keep the subject on tennis until the day's matches are over. Afterwards, it's fine to go off-topic.
I said yesterday that I was picking up Pete at Heathrow - I'm pleased to report that he's safely in Wimbledon now, and the Tribe is likely to hear from him later today.
Daily Weather Report:
Outside, the day looks pretty good so far - there's some cloud cover, but the sun is doing its best to break through. The forecast for the rest of the week looks fine enough, bar Wednesday, men's quarterfinals day, when some heavy precipitation is expected.
Matches of the Day:
Where do we begin? There are plenty of tasty match-ups on offer today. Does this account for the banishment of both Williams sisters to Court 2 for their singles matches? I have a ticket arranged for Court 1, and can't help wondering why Nicole Vaidisova and Anna Chakvetadze open up the programme there, rather than, say, the defending champion, even though her match doesn't look to be one of the most compelling of the day. That honour probably goes to Svetlana Kuznetsova's Centre Court clash with Agnieszka Radwanska, the Eastbourne winner who defeated Kuznetsova at that event just before Wimbledon.
On the men's side, Rafael Nadal faces one of his old nemeses, Mikhail Youzhny. That head-to-head is 6-4 in Nadal's favour, including their Court 2 five-setter last year. Roger Federer takes on a former champion, Lleyton Hewitt, and is the heavy favourite. Feliciano Lopez and Marcos Baghdatis are meeting on Court 18 - a former Wimbledon quarterfinalist versus a former semifinalist. Marat Safin on Court 1 attempths to win four matches in a row for the first time since late 2006, against Stanislas Wawrinka.
But the match of the day could turn out to be Andy Murray's meeting with last year's semifinalist, Richard Gasquet. Murray has not beaten his contemporary in two previous attempts, but has been playing very well so far. A win today would take him to his first Grand Slam quarterfinal, and we know whose side the crowd will be on - unlike the previous meeting between the two, which took place in Paris.
Picture of the Day:
I took this one of the defending champion after her first-round match on Centre Court last Tuesday.
As always, enjoy today's tennis.