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Two tickets for Wimbledon Centre Court? That’ll be £586,000 please

A pair of debenture tickets changed hands this week for a sum far beyond the means of ordinary tennis fansLike many of us, Marcos Ortega enters the Wimbledon public ticket ballot every year in the hope of seeing some championship tennis. In seven straight years of trying, however, he has never got lucky. So he was delighted – initially, at least – to learn there was a way to secure a ticket for every game played on Centre Court.But Ortega’s hopeful delight quickly turned to anger when he discovered that it would cost him £293,000. Continue reading...

6 hours ago

‘I understand why some people think I’m a bitch’: world no 1 Aryna Sabalenka on screaming, stunt matches, and why she’s much nicer off court

Last month she had a post-defeat meltdown and insisted she was done with tennis. On the eve of Wimbledon, she talks about what really happened – and why her ‘aggressive’ face gives people the wrong impressionIt’s less than a month since Aryna Sabalenka told the world that she felt like walking away from tennis. The world No 1 had suffered an almighty implosion. Sabalenka is as famous for her implosions as she is for her on-court ferocity. But this was a different level.She had been playing at her imperious best in the French Open, one of tennis’s four major tournaments. Winner after winner from the back of the court, and when she bullied her opponents back to the baseline she’d dupe them with the most delicate drop-shot. In the last 16 against Naomi Osaka she looked invincible. And then came the quarter-final. By now, all her main rivals were out. The 28-year-old had a clear path through to winning her fifth grand slam singles title. Again, she was playing well against the world’s No 25, Diana Shnaider. Sabalenka won the first set easily, 6-3, and was 5-3 up in the second set. Victory was an inevitability. And then it happened. One game lost. Then another. And another. The wind had picked up, playing conditions got ever worse, the organisers failed to close the roof. And Sabalenka was walloping shot after shot out of court. Continue reading...

6 hours ago