LONDON—How can tennis make the front page? It’s very simple: Find a way to bring the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge—you know them as Kate and Wills—out to watch every match. The royal couple graces the covers of virtually all of the London papers this morning, and for a few hours Wimbledon has a new, youthful cache. Now what are the chances we can get them to the Regions Morgan Keegan Classic in Memphis in February . . .
The Telegraph leads with the couple doing the Wave—called, for some reason, the Mexican Wave. Kate looks good, and William is a little goony, but he’s being a good sport. Right behind them is Billie Jean King in pearls and a black T-shirt. Not completely sure about that fashion choice for the Royal Box.
—The paper follows later with a Q and A with Boris Becker, under this headline:
I’M NOT YOUR CHILDREN’S FATHER . . . AM I?
Becker is a BBC Wimbledon commentator (a sample of his analysis from yesterday: “there’s another backhand winner from del Potro”) and one of the past champions, like Pat Cash and John McEnroe, whom the country has adopted in lieu of a winner of its own. He shows up six hours late to the interview. Asked about athletes’ cheating ways, Becker starchily maintains that sports stars are no more prone to straying than anyone else, they just have more “opportunity.” He asks the female interviewer if she knows where her husband is at that moment. She says yes, he’s picking up the children, she knows where he is.
“Ah, maybe this afternoon,” Becker sagely retorts, “but where is he all the time? What about those 15 minutes between appointments? That’s enough time for an affair!”
—OK, enough with the past. It’s time for the next chapter in the Andy Murray saga, and the Telegraph wastes no time getting it started with this headline:
"DEMOLITION MAN: Murray destroys Gasquet (and sets up clash with his mum’s favorite pin-up)"
Following this are three of Judy Murray’s tweets concerning “Deliciano” Lopez, including this one: “It’s a Felifest at Wimbledon tmrw. Twice in one day. Too much. Way too much.”
Is Judy Murray a bit much? Or is she a breath of fresh, unstuffy air through the stuffy confines of tennis? I like her fierceness, and she did make an earthy counterpart to Kate Middleton yesterday. Though I do share the curiosity with many about whether Murray would be better off if she backed off, at least publicly. He might not; like another mama’s boy, Jimmy Connors, he’s done extremely well with her there.
Whatever you may think of her Deliciano tweets, though, the mental image they call up probably beats the one we get from another message that she sent out yesterday over Twitter:
“Aaaaay, Macarena . . . Jamie [Murray] busting some moves on the player balcony . . . .”
As for the aforementioned Feli, he says that one reason he fought so hard to come back from two sets down in his last match was that he wanted to play Murray, in the quarters, on Centre—he didn’t mention Judy, but it’s safe to say she’ll be watching.
—Finally, Simon Briggs reports that at least 10 players have felt sick to their stomachs at the tournament this year. The presumed culprit is a new pasta and seafood bar in the players’ dining area.