OpenGolf: Art Spander on The Open

By Art Spander
Special to OpenGolf.com/R & A Championships Limited

Forty years ago I was caught under the spell, hooked by the magic of an event so old but yet so current. It was 1968, at Carnoustie, the grayness and gloom, my first Open, and gloriously not my last.

Americans can be chauvinistic, can look across the Atlantic and wonder why the Brits take their beer cool rather than cold or why a broken machine can’t be fixed in hours instead of days, but we remain enthralled with both The Open and Wimbledon, the best of Britain.

Tennis on grass courts, so special; golf on linksland, so different. The Open — and now, led by the perception of Tiger Woods who began calling it that, like the locals — is as much circus as sport, a mid-summer party.

“Aye, laddie,’’ asked the man at pub. “You here for the golf?’’ The Golf. What a beautiful way to describe a competition which started in the middle of the 19th Century. The Golf. The Open.

We all know the stories of American pros coming to the Open, Sam Snead the first time at St. Andrews describing the course as turnip patch. Where were the sculptured fairways lined by trees? But eventually they understood the charm and frustration of links golf.

Walter Hagen would come back. Arnold Palmer would come back. Jack Nicklaus would come back. Tiger has come back.

Open galleries are knowledgeable and proud. They want players to be challenged, whether by a bunker or by the wind, but no less they want players to succeed. A great shot brings both excitement and an ovation generated from history.

Always there is a reference. The plaque to Arnie on what now is the 16th at Royal Birkdale. The photo of Gary Player against the wall at Royal Lytham & St. Annes. Remember when Nicklaus hurled his putter in triumph at St. Andrews in 1970? As we go forward, time goes into reverse.

The game is international now, a world tour if you will, full of Brits and Aussies, Yankees and Swedes, South Africans and Japanese. They flit from continent to continent. But in July the best invariably are in the UK, at Hoylake or Birkdale or this year Turnberry.

Back home, back in the US of A, people will be up early — there’s a five-hour time change to New York, eight to California — and watching on television. Watching and wishing they could be here, walking through the tented village, hoisting a glass of lager and tramping along the dunes.

The Open has to be experienced as well as viewed, has to be put in context. “You going to the British Open, again?’’ a friend asked at the start of June. The question didn’t deserve an answer.

A few years back, another journalist, more envious than respectful, told me, “You’d swim to get to the British Open.’’ An exaggeration. But not much of one.

The Open is rain off the sea and a breeze in your face. The Open is a ball flying into the whin and grasses and fans pointing to where they thought it ought to be, but as was the case with Tiger the first shot in 2003 at Royal St. George’s, is not there at all.

The Open is a week of surprises, not all of them delightful. Back in 1970, at St. Andrews, the sun was shining and the sky blue. The warning was not to walk without an umbrella, but I ignored the advice. Drenched, I wandered back to the press tent. At the Open, there are lessons for us all.

Art Spander is a longtime sports and golf columnist from the San Francisco Bay Area, now with the San Francisco Examiner. He recently received the PGA of America’s Lifetime Achievement Award in journalism, and previously was a winner of the McCann Award, gaining a place in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. He has won six first-place awards in Golf Writers Association of America writing competition. He has written for the Daily Telegraph and (Glasgow) Sunday Herald, and is attending his 137th major championship.
 

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Tiger and elements at the start of British Open week

TURNBERRY, Scotland –- A light rain had stopped, leaving only gloom and silence. The Open is coming, and the stage must be set. This is a golf resort, Turnberry, not a beach resort. The elements must come into play.

There is a myth about golf in this country where the game was created. “Nae wind, nae rain, nae golf,’’ is the axiom. But here they’ll tell you that’s a slogan more Madison Avenue than Glasgow High Street. The folks would prefer sunshine. They don’t usually have it.

When we think of the British Open, we think not only of links courses, those bold, rolling venues once under the sea, but of difficult weather -- as if any weather could be more difficult than that of our own Open, three weeks past at Bethpage, where the rain never stopped.

The famous Duel in the Sun, between Tom Watson and Jack Nicklaus in 1977, was at Turnberry, on Scotland’s West Coast, along the Firth of Clyde, Watson winning after shooting 65-65 the last two days against Jack’s 65-66. There wasn’t a cashmere sweater within sight. Not many bogies to be seen, either.

But when in 1986 the Open returned to Turnberry, the weather the first day -- 25 mph winds, a steady downpour -- was particularly nasty. Only one player, Ian Woosnam, was as low as even par, or as the phrasing goes here, level par.

Turnberry is not a town but a Victorian hotel, constructed in 1906 above courses opened in 1901 and twice turned into Royal Air Force bases, for World War I and World War II. Even now, after the restoration, after three previous Opens, cement from the old airplane runways still is visible.

Also visible Sunday, in a manner of speaking, was Tiger Woods, who played a practice round on Turnberry’s Ailsa Course, which until two weeks ago had been closed for changes and, if you think harder is better, improvement.

It was Tiger’s introduction to Turnberry, where the men who won the three Opens here, Watson in ’77, Greg Norman in ’86 and Nick Price in ’94, all are living members of the World Golf Hall of Fame.

Not that Tiger can leap tall buildings in a single bound, but he must have some magic. By the time he was into his back nine, the clouds rolled by and the sun appeared.

“We got the best of the weather today,’’ said Woods. “No wind. The course is in great shape.’’

Presumably so was Tiger, although he had arrived at Prestwick Airport, about 20 miles north, after an overnight flight, picked up a yardage  booklet in the pro shop -- as we might if we could afford the $375 greens fee -- went straight to the first tee, skipping the driving range, and fired away.

Peter Dawson, chairman of the Royal and Ancient, which runs the Open, caught up with Woods, first on foot, then after leaping into a golf cart, on wheels. Can’t let the prize entrant feel unwanted.

There is a small building, a halfway house, with a restroom between the ninth and 10th holes, but when Tiger tried the door he found it locked. A marshal quickly obtained a key. “My teeth were swimming in my head,’’ a grateful Tiger told the man.

That Woods never had played Turnberry until Sunday is of no particular consequence. Experience is advisory on links courses but hardly mandatory. Tiger never had seen Royal Liverpool until Open week in 2006. Of course he won. Tom Watson took his first shot at Carnoustie in 1975 the week of the tournament and won. And then there was the late Tony Lema of the Bay Area, San Leandro, in 1964.

Lema’s manager, the famed Fred Corcoran, told Tony to get in some practice rounds since he’d never seen a links course before. “Just let me tee it up,’’ was Lema’s response. “I don’t build courses, I play ’em.’’

He played historic St. Andrews better than Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Gary Player, better than anyone, winning virtually sight unseen. When a British writer wondered of Tony, “How did you find the course?’’ his flip California answer was, “I just walked out of the clubhouse and there it was.’’

Whenever Tiger walks out of a clubhouse, he’s inevitably the favorite. Seven different bookmaking agencies in Britain, where betting is legal, all list Tiger as the choice, the odds varying slightly from 7-to-4 at Ladbroke’s to 9-to-4 at Paddypower. For what it’s worth, Sergio Garcia is next at 20-to-1.

Woods reportedly hit his tee shot into the rough on Turnberry’s second and never looked for the ball. The rough is long.

“They had a medal (stroke play event) for the members –- 150 starters -– and they left 480 balls on the course,’’ said Colin Montgomerie, who has a golf academy here.  “That’s three a player. Avoid the rough at all costs.’’

Easy to say but, as even Tiger learned, hard to do.

RealClearSports: An Unstable Sporting World

By Art Spander

Bill Bradley, the basketball great, "Dollar Bill'' with the Knicks and then U.S. Senator, said maybe more than once the great change in sports is change. Teams and players used to be as immobile as an oak. It was reassuring. We knew who was where.

Now it's near chaos. The LPGA is dumping its commissioner. The NBA has shrunk its salary cap. Ron Artest, for about the hundredth time -- or does it just seem that way -- is joining another club in the NBA, the Lakers.

The San Francisco 49ers are intent on becoming the Santa Clara 49ers, although no way they use that name. When you live or play in California, instability is a way of life.

The Sacramento Kings want to move. The San Diego Chargers want to move. The Oakland Raiders want to move. The Oakland A's want to move. Probably tied in with the San Andreas Fault.

But we crazies on the West Coast don't have a patent on this stuff. The Nets are trying to get out of Jersey and go to Brooklyn. The Dodgers, of course, got out of Brooklyn and went to L.A., but that was when Joe Torre still was a teenager. In Brooklyn.

Even Europe is in for a massive sporting overhaul. The great soccer teams are ready to give the back of the hand to the wusses. The thinking is why should Real Madrid and the guys who spent millions on players such as Cristiano Renaldo be unable to recoup their investment, being forced to play lesser clubs in their own country?

According to Matthew Syed of the Times of London, geography isn't going to mean much any more. What will count, as in the United States, is wealth. So Real Madrid and FC Barcelona, and their global superstars, will be facing Manchester United or Bayern Munich or AC Milan.

As Syed asks, "Would Chelsea make more cash playing regularly against Wigan Athletic and Hull City, as at present, or Barcelona and Inter Milan in a Super League?''

The LPGA isn't making enough cash with Carolyn Bivens as commissioner. The tough economic times and her rigid policies -- not including the intolerance of trying to force the ladies to speak English or take a hike --have stripped the organization of numerous tournaments. There's a rebellion under way.

People who ought to be worrying about signing their scorecards have been signing a petition.

It's all about freedom, we're told. Freedom for golfers to speak their mind. Freedom for team players to leave when they choose. Freedom for franchises to look for some over-eager, misguided community to build them a new stadium or ballpark or arena.

The old reserve clause was a form of slavery. This is a form of confusion. Is Jason Kidd coming, going or staying? Is he on the Mavericks, the Knicks, the Nets or the Cal alumni?

Carolyn Bivens, you can be certain, is going. According to Golfweek magazine, "it's the latest blow to a tour which has lost seven tournaments since 2007,'' including three in Hawaii. That's real trouble, when people won't come to Hawaii to play golf.

The benchmark of this distress was that city on Lake Erie. Twenty years ago, the Indians and Browns played in Cleveland Municipal Stadium. To prove we know nothing, if someone asked which team might move the unanimous response would have been the Indians, who had pathetic crowds. The Browns sold out every game.

However, the Browns shifted to Baltimore, while the Indians stayed, were provided a new park and had years of sellouts. Now the Browns are back. Sort of sporting musical chairs. For hundreds of millions of dollars.

Candlestick Park opened in 1960 for the San Francisco Giants, then was expanded in 1970 and '71 to bring in the 49ers, who were playing in a dump, if a historic dump, called Kezar Stadium. Now Candlestick is a dump, or to be exact, "a pigsty,'' as designated by former team president Eddie DeBartolo.

The Niners, who won five Super Bowls, contend they deserve better. And they do. But 40 miles away in Santa Clara?

San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom doesn't want to be remembered as the politico who couldn't hang on to the city's most famous, most successful and original hometown team, the one that didn't move from New York, as the Giants, or Philadelphia, as the Warriors.

But in this era when nothing is tied down, athletes, teams or golf commissioners, he doesn't want the place once known as the "city that knows how,'' to be put in the vise, squeezed during these times of foreclosures and declining tax collections.

Newsom, on a Comcast program called "Chronicle Live," said he wanted to "avoid being used as leverage'' in the Niners' negotiations with Santa Clara for that maybe-it-will-maybe-it-won't stadium.

That's all sports has become, Mr. Mayor, leverage. Real Madrid has it. Ron Artest has it. Carolyn Bivens doesn't. The next move is not very far off.

As a reporter since 1960, Art Spander is a living treasure of sports history. A recipient of the Dick McCann Memorial Award -- given for his long and distinguished career covering professional football -- he has earned himself a spot in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. And he has recently been honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award by the PGA of America for 2009.

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http://www1.realclearsports.com/articles/2009/07/09/an_unstable_sporting_world_96424.html
© RealClearSports 2009 

SF Examiner: In Britain, every contest overflows with emotion

By Art Spander
Special to The Examiner

LONDON — Maybe they have the right idea here. Sports are not merely fun and games, items to be covered dispassionately — Giants, win; Raiders sign tackle — but reflections of history.

In Britain, even the smallest of competitions invariably are “us against them.”

“Them” can be a sporting club in the next town. Or Tiger Woods. Or at the moment, with The Ashes at stake in a cricket competition which extends back to 1877, Australia — a nation which started as an English penal colony.

One of England’s stars, Kevin Pietersen, made the most banal of comments, alluding to the Aussies down a couple of stars from past teams which, of course, whupped the English. “Pietersen Expects Australia to Come Out Fighting,” said the headline in the Telegraph.

All sports news is reported subjectively and patriotically, reminding one of that line about the World War II general, Bernard Montgomery, of whom Winston Churchill said, “In defeat unbeatable; in victory unbearable.”

Nobody simply is beaten here, say as Randy Johnson when he was injured on Sunday. Losers are “brave” or “hopeless” or “worthless.” Or worse, were “cheated.” Somebody always is “accusing” an opponent of an impropriety.

We have our issues, certainly, the Tuck Play (it was a fumble), but not like the Brits. When South Africa beat the British Lions in rugby a few days ago it was because one of the South African players gouged the eye of a Brit.

“Question,” asked The Sun, “When can you gouge? Answer, when you turn out for South Africa.” The Sun went on to point out, “South Africa’s ruling body covered up Schalk Burger’s eye-gouging shame.” Burger was listed as “a thug.”

So, with a variation on that theme, we describe the Warriors as pathetic, the 49ers as clueless, the A’s as disgraceful, the Raiders as mortifying. We say the Giants warn the Dodgers about using Manny. That might get some attention.

And we take sides, as they do when Andy Murray, the tennis star, is at Wimbledon. “Hopes of a nation are with you, Andy.” Sure, “Hopes of a region are with you, Cal.” (Excepting those people at Stanford.)

The reverse was when on a single weekend a few years ago, England flops in World Cup soccer, cricket, track and who knows what else, “We’re Rubbish,” proclaimed the Daily Mail.

Imagine the English tabloid headlines on our flawed franchises. “Sell them Chris, if you know what’s good for you.” “Please don’t let the Sharks near the playoffs again.” “Why can’t Sabean find a slugger?”

Newspapers are in trouble in Britain, as the United States, but like the Aussie cricketers, they come out fighting, battling for readers the way the English did at Bunker Hill, or was it Henman Hill at Wimbledon?

Every contest is a matter of pride. Of good and evil. Of overflowing emotion. When Ana Ivanovic quit against Venus Williams at Wimbledon because of an injury, the Sun headline was “Venus sad for hurt Ana.” And about Andy Roddick’s upcoming quarter-final against Lleyton Hewitt, “Rod warns: Lleyt is great.”

But not as great as the people who write sports in England. Be warned, they are not rubbish.

Art Spander has been covering Bay Area sports since 1965 and also writes on www.artspander.com and www.realclearsports.com. E-mail him at typoes@aol.com.

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Copyright 2009 SF Newspaper Company

CBSSports.com: Booming Roddick brings out best in great Federer

By Art Spander
The Sports Xchange/CBSSports.com

WIMBLEDON, England -- The match that seemed endless ended too soon for Andy Roddick. If the man who beat him in one of the greatest Wimbledon men's finals isn't the finest tennis player in history, he'll do for a long while.

Roger Federer proved he has courage and staying power, as well as some of the finest strokes ever, by hanging on to defeat Roddick 5-7, 7-6 (6), 7-6 (5), 3-6, 16-14 on a Sunday when Centre Court couldn't take much more suspense.

The victory was Federer's 15th in a Grand Slam, the game's Big Four, separating him from Pete Sampras, with whom he had been tied and who, after an overnight flight from Los Angeles, was in the stands to watch his record fall.

"Thanks for coming, Pete," said Federer, the 27-year-old Swiss. "It's such a pleasure to do it in front of such great legends."

Besides Sampras, the famed royal box included Bjorn Borg, Manolo Santana, Ilie Nastase and Rod Laver, champions all who had come to see whether Federer could produce on demand.

And despite Roddick -- the American doomed to become the other man in these dramas, having now lost to Federer three times in a Wimbledon final -- Roger managed to do what was needed.

"My head is still spinning," Federer said after a match that, because there are no tiebreakers in the fifth set at Wimbledon, went 4 hours, 18 minutes.

The 16-14 set, which required 1 hour, 35 minutes, is said to be the longest fifth in a Slam, bypassing the 11-9 in the 1927 French Open, when Rene LaCoste defeated Bill Tilden. Talk about legends.

Roddick will not be spoken of with those two, or with Federer, who beat him for the 19th time in 21 meetings, eight of those in Slams, four at Wimbledon.

Rather, he will be discussed as the unfortunate individual who came along at the wrong time, the guy who did everything possible except overtake Federer.

It seemed he might in this third consecutive Wimbledon final to go five sets -- Rafael Nadal beat Federer last year -- Roddick let his chances get away. Or maybe Federer, as winners do, grabbed them.

Asked if he lost to the world's greatest tennis player, Roddick sighed, "Yeah."

In the second set, Roddick led Federer 6-2 in the tiebreak and at 6-5 had a volley to win the set. But the shot was wide, and Federer, with six consecutive points, went on to even the match at one set apiece.

"There was a pretty significant wind behind him," Roddick said of the shot, which went wide. "When he first hit it, I thought I wasn't going to play it. Last minute, it looked like it started dropping. I couldn't get my racket around on it."

Federer ended up winning the tiebreak 8-6 and in time he would win his sixth Wimbledon.

There was no falling on his knees this time. Rather, when Roddick shanked the final shot, Federer leaped like some NBA player about to hit a dunk shot.

"I'm sorry, Pete," Roddick said, addressing Sampras with his typical flippancy. "I tried to hold him off. But it was a pleasure playing here today. Pete, Manolo, I still hope someday my name will be up there with theirs as a winner of this tournament.

"But I just want to say congratulations to Roger. He is a true champion and deserves everything he gets."

In the great dream here, the men's final of the All England Lawn Tennis Championships would have been between Federer and the Scot, Andy Murray. In anticipation, some people paid $2,000 to $3,000 for tickets.

Maybe the Brits didn't get what they wanted, but you can get what you need, as the Rolling Stones sing -- and you can't get much more English than they are. What tennis always needs is a final full of drama, a final in which every point is critical.

That's what happened Sunday.

Roddick used more than his powerful serve -- his fastest was 143 mph -- to stay even with Federer. He wasn't broken once until the very last point of the match, holding serve the first 37 times. But Federer won the tiebreakers and eventually the match and the title.

In the fifth set, when the score got to 14-13, it seemed as if somebody had missed an extra point rather than a first serve.

In somewhat of a reversal of expectations, Roddick was strong in rallies, Federer on serves.

"He served great," Roddick said. "If he hadn't served as well, I'd probably be sitting here in a better mood." Federer had 50 aces, Roddick only 27.

When asked what makes Federer what he is, Roddick shrugged. "I don't know where to start," he said. "He makes it real tough. He was having trouble picking up my serve today for the first time ever. He just stayed the course.

"You didn't even get the sense he was really frustrated. He gets a lot of credit for a lot of things, but not how many matches he digs deep and toughs it out. He doesn't get a lot of credit for that because it looks easy for him a lot of times."

It wasn't easy. "This could have gone on two more hours," said Federer. He already was wearing a warmup jacket with a golden "15" on the back.

That puts him one ahead of Sampras, of course, and 14 ahead of Roddick, whose only Slam victory came in the 2003 U.S. Open. For a while, the way he played, the way he battled, there was a thought he could wrench away a second.

But when someone asked him to describe what he did, Roddick could only say, "I lost."

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http://www.cbssports.com/tennis/story/11925724
© 2009 CBS Interactive. All rights reserved.

Newsday.com: Serena beats Venus for her third Wimbledon title

BY ART SPANDER
Special to Newsday

WIMBLEDON, England - She's a tennis player again. The champion again. The Serena Williams who wanted to dabble in television and fashion is now back on the stage she knows best and back on top. Who said there are no second acts in American lives?

Serena won the battle of the Williams sisters, the battle of Wimbledon, defeating her older sibling, Venus, 7-6 (3), 6-2, Saturday in the women's final.

This was Serena's 11th major singles title and, starting with the U.S. Open last September, her third in the last four. She's missing only the French, where she made it to the quarterfinals.Not long ago, television commentator Mary Carillo reminded her audience that an athlete, in this case Serena, would regret not taking advantage of her peak years.

But now Serena is looking forward again. At 27, she is talking about competition for another three or four years. She's back where she was in 2003 and 2004. In fact, she's better than she was in '03 and '04.

"I've played a lot this year, and I've paid the price. I've really just wanted to focus on tennis, and I've really been doing that.''

What she did to Venus, who had won 20 straight matches, 34 straight sets, two straight Wimbledons and a total of five overall, was keep her moving, slugging forehands to the corners. Then Serena won the first-set tiebreak, reminiscent of the U.S. Open quarterfinals, where she beat Venus with two tiebreakers.

"When I went out on court, I felt this was one of the few times I didn't expect to come out with the win. I felt I had nothing to lose. Then when I won that first set, I was like, 'Wow, this is great.' No matter what, I'm a set away.''

Venus again had wads of tape on her left leg to protect a knee her father, Richard, said was a problem but which she refused to discuss. "I think I played well,'' Venus said, noticeably dispirited, "but she just seemed to play better. There's no easy way of losing, especially when it's so close to the crown.''

This was the fourth time Serena had beaten Venus in a major final and the 11th time Serena had beaten Venus of the 21 matches they have played overall.

"In the tiebreak,'' Venus said, "I would play a good shot, and she'd just hit a winner off of it or put me in a position where she could hit another winner.''

In other words, despite predictions, Serena controlled the match, not Venus, who conceded in the second set she began to rush her shots. "I think I lost it from the ground [strokes],'' was Venus' analysis.

There was a brief rain shower about an hour before the 2 p.m. (British summer time) start, but after tarps were placed on court, the sun came out, and there was no thought of utilizing the new roof.

What Venus could have utilized was that big serve, but as she mentioned a few days ago, against Serena her 127-mph serve often comes flying back.

"It feels so amazing," Serena said after being presented the trophy, called coincidentally the Venus Rosewater Dish. "I can't believe I'm holding it and Venus isn't in. She always wins.''

Serena has won three of the past four major singles titles, though when the world rankings come out tomorrow, she will be No. 2 to Dinara Safina, whom Venus destroyed in the semifinals.

"If you hold three Grand Slam titles, maybe you should be No. 1, but not on the WTA Tour, obviously," Serena said.

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CBSSports.com: In all-Williams final, little sister has all the answers

By Art Spander
The Sports Xchange/CBSSports.com

WIMBLEDON, England -- It was the little sister who came up big. It was Serena Williams who made the shots, made the comments and, with a T-shirt that offered both a laugh and a reference to her greatness, made everyone understand she has a sense of humor as well as a brilliant forehand.

Venus Williams was the defending champion. Venus Williams was going for her sixth Wimbledon singles title. Venus Williams was the favorite. Venus Williams, however, came in second in a two-sister battle at Centre Court.

In truth, it was less a battle than a romp. For Serena, that is, who defeated Venus 7-6 (3), 6-2 on a Saturday of great potential and disappointing outcome. Not in who won, since both the Williams are champions, but in how Serena won.

Venus was going for a third straight title. Venus had won 20 straight matches at Wimbledon, 34 straight sets. Then she lost two straight sets. In 1 hour, 28 minutes.

"She had an answer for everything," Venus said of Serena.

But we had no answers for what happened to Venus, who again wore tape to brace a left knee her absent father Richard -- he had flown home to Florida to avoid watching daughter against daughter -- said was a problem but of which Venus, stubbornly in denial, said, "I have no complaints."

She no longer has the trophy that carries her name, the Venus Rosewater Dish, given the champion. For the third time, but the first time in six years, that belongs to 27-year-old Serena, who came to the news conference in a T-shirt that read, "Are you looking at my titles?"

"Well," explained a particularly jovial Serena, in full commercial mode, "this shirt is available at Nike stores, if you guys want to go get one. I thought [Friday] night, when I was getting my stuff together, if I win, I'll wear this because I would have 11 titles and I wouldn't know if you were looking at my titles or my Gatorade bottle."

Hey, it's been a great few years. She's entitled to have some fun. Serena has won three of the last four Slams, the U.S. Open in September, Australian Open in February and now in July, Wimbledon, her 11th Slam overall.

After Thursday's semis, in which Serena saved match point against Elena Dementieva, she said, "Obviously, Venus is the favorite." And Serena conceded when she walked out on Centre Court, "This is one of the few times I didn't expect to come out with the win."

So she played a gambling style, using her big serve, ripping forehands into the corners. Never was broken. And then after winning the first set on a tiebreaker (she had beaten Venus in the U.S. Open quarters on two tiebreakers) took advantage of Venus' suddenly ineffective serve and lack of movement.

"I felt like I had nothing to lose," said Serena. "When I won that first set, I was like, 'Wow, this is great.' No matter what, I'm a set away."

They are siblings, but they are not alike. Serena shows her emotions, tells you what she's thinking. Venus is the mystery lady, revealing very little.

On the BBC telecast, Tracy Austin said Venus' second serve was "slower and predictable." In the interview room later, Venus said, "I don't agree on that; [Serena] had a hard time stepping into my second serve."

Venus did concede she played too far behind the baseline in the second set when she was broken twice, the second time on match point.

"I tried my best," said 29-year-old Venus. "She just played so well. She really lifted her game. There's no easy way of losing, especially when it's so close to the crown.

"She played great, especially in the tiebreak. I don't think I did too many things wrong in the tiebreak. Just, I would hit a good shot, and she would hit a winner off it or put me in position where she could hit another winner."

The sisters have played six times in Grand Slam finals. Serena has won four. The sisters have played 21 times overall. Serena has won 11.

Serena is No. 2 in the women's rankings, behind Dinara Safina, who was crushed 6-1, 6-0 by Venus in the Wimbledon semis. The points system is skewed, and confusing.

"I'd rather be No. 2 and hold three Grand Slams in the past year than be No. 1 and not have any," Serena insisted. Then with a bit of a needle she added, "I see myself as No. 2. That's where I am. I think Dinara did a great job to get to No. 1. She won Rome and Madrid."

A couple of years back, injuries and boredom had an effect on Serena, who didn't play a great deal and didn't do well when she was playing.

"I feel like I've played a lot this year and I've paid the price," said Serena. "For several years now, three or four years, I just really wanted to focus on tennis, and I've really been doing that. I feel like this is where I want to be, and this is my chance to capitalize on everything."

In the Wimbledon women's final of 2009, no question she certainly capitalized on her big sister.

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http://www.cbssports.com/tennis/story/11923402
© 2009 CBS Interactive. All rights reserved.

CBSSports.com: Roddick gains independence from doubt in banner Wimbledon for U.S.

By Art Spander
The Sports Xchange/CBSSports.com 

WIMBLEDON, England -- He was overlooked and underestimated. Andy Roddick was considered of another generation. Time and tennis supposedly had passed him by. "Some people," he said, "were not giving me much of chance."

But it wasn't so much what anyone gave him. It was what Roddick took. He played tennis the way Pete Sampras and the Aussies like Rod Laver used to play it, going to the net, going for the jugular. And now, in a surprise, he's going to the Wimbledon final.

The Fourth of July, the celebration of America's independence from England. It's not a holiday over here. They had hoped to make it one, for another reason.

They had hoped Andy Murray would give them Britain's first men's singles finalist in 71 years and their first men's singles champion in 73 years. But it's not to be because of Roddick.

Wave the stars and stripes. Fly the flag, as they say here.

Roddick, the 26-year-old, the over-the-hill guy, beat Murray, the Scot -- "The Hero," as the tabloid Sun called him -- 6-4, 4-6, 7-6 (7), 7-6 (5) Friday in what must be considered an upset.

So Roddick gets to the final for the third time but for the first time in four years where, for better or worse on Sunday, he'll face the great Roger Federer.

Federer will be playing in the Wimbledon final a seventh straight year, which never had been accomplished -- but they've only been playing here since 1877 -- and the final of a Grand Slam event a 15th time of the last 16 opportunities. He had the expected easy time against Tommy Haas, 7-6 (3), 7-5, 6-3.

Federer has five Wimbledon titles, all in a row, 2003-07, a streak stopped last year by Rafael Nadal. One more, at Wimbledon or at the U.S. Open, wherever, and Roger, the 27-year-old Swiss, breaks the tie with Sampras and wins his record 15th Grand Slam title.

"I'm very proud of all the records I've achieved," said Federer, "because I never thought I could be successful as a kid."

Not many people, Roddick included, thought Roddick could again be successful after last year. But he joins Serena and Venus Williams, who meet in Saturday's women's final, as poignant voices of American tennis.

Three of the four singles finalists are from the U.S., and Venus and Serena will team up in the women's doubles final, also Saturday. Maybe someone besides the Russians can play the game.

When Roddick, who won the 2003 U.S. Open and then eventually lost to Federer in the '04 and '05 Wimbledon finals, was stunned by Janko Tipsarevic in the second round at Wimbledon in 2008, he wasn't sure he could play it anymore.

"Oh yeah," he answered when someone asked Roddick if he doubted he again could get as far as a Grand Slam final. "That was a hard couple of weeks."

Referring to his bride of four months, Brooklyn, then his fiancée, Roddick explained, "Brook and I had a lot of talks if I thought I could still play and at least be toward the top of the game. I definitely questioned [that]. The rest of the year I was kind of hurt."

He connected with a new coach, Larry Stefanki, who played at Cal and is married to one of the daughters of former San Francisco 49ers quarterback John Brodie. Roddick made new commitments, to diet, to work, to getting to bed early.

"I gave myself every opportunity to succeed," he said.

Murray, 22, had every opportunity to succeed this week. And the pressure of a nation desperately wanting him to succeed. "Beam Us Up, Andy," was the headline in Friday's Sun. Another, in the Times, was, "Andy is fighting for his life and will not give up."

The front pages of the dailies were all on Michael Jackson, the back pages on Andy Murray. But in the battle of the Andys -- "Andymonium," someone called it -- Roddick survived, and on match point he fell to his knees and grabbed his head.

"I didn't know," Roddick would sigh, "if I'd ever get a chance of playing for another Grand Slam title. But make no mistake, I've been a much better player than I was last year."

Against Murray, Stefanki advised Roddick, normally a baseline player, went to the net, like grasscourt players of the past.

"He came up with some good volleys," Murray said of Roddick. "I mean, he makes volleys. He normally doesn't miss a lot. You have to make [passing shots], and I didn't make as many as I needed. But he serves so well, it makes it even more important for you to serve well. If you don't do that, he's going to create chances, because he came to the net a lot today."

Federer has an 18-2 record against Roddick and has beaten him in three Grand Slam finals -- '04 and '05 here, '06 in the U.S. Open.

"I think if he serves like he did, 130 miles an hour, [a percentage] in the high 70s, 80, regardless of whether it's Roger or me or anybody else, [Roddick's] got a good chance," Murray said.

At least he has a chance. He's in the final. Not a bad couple of days for the USA.
 
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http://www.cbssports.com/tennis/story/11920629
© 2009 CBS Interactive. All rights reserved.

CBSSports.com: Venus, Serena support for each other will take Saturday off

By Art Spander
The Sports Xchange/CBSSports.com

WIMBLEDON, England -- Still the big sister. Venus Williams made that clear. As before, she made clear how overwhelming she can be on the lawns of Wimbledon, her little Edens in the chaos of big-time tennis.

She's back, like the shark in Jaws. Venus is back, in the final once more, playing Serena Williams once more Saturday, the Fourth of July, perfect for two Americans.

Almost as perfect as Venus was in destroying the player seeded first, the player first in the women's rankings, dumbfounded Dinara Safina.

"I think," sighed Safina, "she's just too good on grass. She gave me a pretty good lesson today."

Venus needed only 51 minutes for what was less a match than a mismatch in one of Thursday's two semifinals.

Serena didn't have it quite as easy or swift. She was one shot away from losing to Elena Dementieva, who like Safina is Russian. But Dementieva couldn't make that shot, a cross-court backhand, in the 10th game of the third set, and Serena finished a 6-7, 7-5, 8-6 winner.

The shortest set in that one was only a minute less than Venus' entire match. In the end, Serena and Dementieva, who was more aggressive, hitting better forehands, but couldn't hang on, played 2 hours, 49 minutes, the longest women's semi in Wimbledon's records.

So it is Venus, trying for a sixth championship and third in a row, against Serena, who lost to her in the final last year but won a couple of Wimbledon titles herself in 2002 and 2003.

Sibling against sibling, Williams against Williams, for the fourth time in a Wimbledon final, the 21st time overall. Each has 10 victories. Each feels compassion toward the other. Each desperately wants the trophy, interestingly named the Venus Rosewater Dish.

"It is different," Venus said of playing Serena, "because I'm happy for her to be in the final, but I have to face her and defeat her. I don't necessarily want her to lose, but for sure I want me to win.

"Maybe that doesn't make sense, but when I'm playing someone else, I want them to lose. I don't like to ever see her disappointed in any way. But at the same time, I don't want to see myself disappointed."

Venus is 29 and more protective than 27-year-old Serena, who, with her Twitter and Facebook, is considerably more outspoken. Venus is cautious in her remarks. Serena can be outrageous.

"But, you know," a candid Venus said, "I need to get my titles, too. I'm still the big sister."

The first few times the Williamses met, in the U.S. Open at the beginning of the decade, at Wimbledon, there were suggestions their father Richard decided who would be the winner before they took the court.

Whether that was legitimate speculation or stupid contemplation, their early matches seemed to lack emotion.

But over the years any hesitancy has disappeared. They charge and slug and chase down balls against each other as they would against anyone else.

Venus wanted Serena to win Thursday. "It's like, if she didn't win, the dream doesn't come true that we're playing in the final."

Serena wanted Venus to win. "It was like, great going." Now they don't want the other to win.

Venus has to be favored, not only after her clubbing of Safina but because Venus has won 20 consecutive matches at Wimbledon, and 34 sets.

"I feel going into this final," said Serena, "I have nothing to lose. Obviously she's playing the best tennis at this tournament. Start with that and just keep positive."

Serena very well could have lost, maybe should have lost. She challenged a couple of calls that originally went Dementieva's way but that the instant-replay review, Hawk-Eye, verified were incorrect. By fractions of an inch.

But Serena refused to concede she was lucky. "I don't think there was too much luck involved," she said.

Not when Serena was serving. She had 20 aces.

"I definitely owe this one to my serve," she agreed.

Her usually strong forehand was nonexistent. "He didn't show up today," she cracked. "I think he went to Hawaii. But I've called him ... er, her, and asked her to come back for the final. Hopefully she'll come back."

No question Venus has come back. Someone whose English carried a strong Eastern Europe accent told Venus that the score of her match, Safina winning one pathetic game, "is very strange."

Not to Venus.

"I like the score," she said with a smile. "Be honest about that. I think the score just showed my level of play. I was just dictating every point. I felt like my performance has been building each round, better and better."

And only one person can stop her: little sister.

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http://www.cbssports.com/tennis/story/11917043
© 2009 CBS Interactive. All rights reserved.

CBSSports.com: Men's quarters day really does bring the heat -- literally

By Art Spander
The Sports Xchange/CBSSports.com

WIMBLEDON, England -- It was hotter than Bangkok, literally, according to the official temperatures, if at 89 degrees only a notch or two.

It was so hot, the general secretary of the Trades Union Congress said firms should encourage employees to wear shorts "to prevent them from collapsing at their desks."

It was so hot, there were empty seats at Centre Court, some of which had been scalped for more than $1,000 when Britain's long-sought tennis hero appeared.

But that hero, Andy Murray, understood the reasoning.

"It was roasting outside," said Murray, "I wouldn't have recommended anyone sitting in that heat for hours."

Recommended or not, people did sit in that seat. And played tennis in that heat.

On this second Wednesday of Wimbledon 2009, more than mad dogs and Englishmen went out in the midday sun for men's quarterfinals won by Murray, five-time champion Roger Federer, surprising Tommy Haas and, finally, Andy Roddick.

The past month in England has been the hottest, driest and sunniest since 2006, which makes it all the more fascinating that for this Wimbledon the $140 million roof over Centre Court was finally put into operation.

But after another scorcher Thursday for the women's semifinals, the Met Office, the weather bureau here, said change is coming, meaning the men's semis on Friday, Murray against Roddick, Federer against Haas, indeed might be played under that roof if the predicted rains arrive.

In the quarters, Murray, trying to become the first Brit since 1936 to win the men's singles, defeated Juan Carlos Ferrero 7-5, 6-3, 6-2; Federer had a tidy 6-3, 7-5, 7-6 win over Ivo Karlovic; Haas upset No. 4 seed Novak Djokovic 7-5, 7-6, 4-6, 6-3; and Roddick, the American, offered a lot of sweat and even at the end some tears, if no blood, taking 3 hours, 50 minutes to beat Lleyton Hewitt, 6-3, 6-7, 7-6, 4-6, 6-4.

"I'm really happy," said Roddick, twice a finalist -- and twice a loser against Federer. "I haven't been in the Grand Slam picture very much the last two years. Now (with the Australian) I'm in my second semifinal of the year."

When he left the court at a bit after 8 p.m., Andy reached up and dried his eyes. Yes, he was crying. "It was a mixture of happiness and relief," Roddick said. "You know in your mind you're trying to stay the course for four hours, constantly figuring out what you're going to do. So it's relief, happiness and almost a kind of instant shutdown mode."

Immediately after walking to the locker room, Roddick said to the BBC, "I think there's a lot of respect there. We used to get into it a little bit when we were younger, but now we're just a couple of old married dudes."

So, too, finally, is Federer, at 27, second oldest of the four remaining men (Haas is 31, Roddick 26 and Murray 22). Remarkably, Roger has reached a 21st consecutive Grand Slam semifinal and is in position to break his tie with retired Pete Sampras at 14 Slam wins apiece. Not that Federer is getting ahead of himself.

"We all know it would be writing in the history books of tennis," he said. "But it's not there yet."

The roof has been there. Murray defeated Federer's fellow Swiss, Stanislas Wawrinka on Monday night in Wimbledon's first indoor match, and there's still a debate about whether the ball bounces the same indoors.

The All England Club said the temperature when the roof was closed was a steady 75 degrees, much cooler than the record heat outdoors, and humidity a stable 50 percent, lower than outside. Murray, however, said his shots were not the same.

A professor at Sheffield Hallam University told the Times of London that Andy had a point. "When you play outside," said Steve Haake, of the school's department of sports engineering, "there is a breeze. You don't get a carefully controlled environment where the air is not moving and sweat has nowhere to go."

On Wednesday, sweat was everywhere. Fans came to Wimbledon as they might to the Riviera, in shorts, halter tops, straw hats, floppy hats. Kids were splashing in a decorative water run. The line to the ice cream store under the rim of Court 1 stretched 50 yards.

"I like to play my points short," said Federer, the No. 2 seed. "I like short rallies. I think on grass my strength becomes even better, even more dangerous."

Roddick said this Wimbledon might be his best chance, if not his last chance, to add a second Slam to his 2003 U.S. Open championship.

"This one," Andy said of his win over Hewitt, "certainly wasn't short on drama."

Roddick had 43 service aces.

"Andy has been playing great," Roddick said of Murray. "He's certainly come into his own as a player. With my serve, I can give myself a chance in any match."

When you're hot, you're hot.

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http://www.cbssports.com/tennis/story/11913234
© 2009 CBS Interactive. All rights reserved.

CBSSports.com: Venus, Serena again in Wimbledon class of their own

By Art Spander
The Sports Xchange/CBSSports.com

WIMBLEDON, England -- There's a new musical in London, Sister Act, based on the movie of the same name. There's an old tennis routine at Wimbledon, sister act, based on a history of similar results. No dancing in this one, just advancing.

Venus and Serena Williams are at it once more. In the semifinals once more. One win from the final once more.

"That would be fantastic," said Venus. "It's what Serena and I are hoping for, but we still would have to play well."

They hardly can play better than they have been. It was 90 degrees in the shade Tuesday, and there isn't much shade at the All England Club except for some of the seat holders on Centre Court and Court One.

No time to dawdle. The heat was on. So were Venus and Serena.

Venus needed a mere 68 minutes to squash Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland 6-1, 6-2, in one of the quarterfinals. Serena took 73 minutes to gain revenge, 6-2, 6-3 against Victoria Azarenka, who had beaten Serena in Miami in the spring.

In the Thursday semis, Venus, trying for a sixth Wimbledon singles championship and third in a row, faces No. 1 seed Dinara Safina, a 6-7, 6-4, 6-1 winner over Sabine Lisicki, while Serena plays Olympic champion Elena Dementieva, who in the other quarter defeated Francesca Schiavone 6-2, 6-2.

This in an affirmation of those who arrange the seedings. The final four are the top four seeds, Safina (1), Serena (2), Venus (3) and Dementieva (4). If form didn't exactly follow function, there wasn't much deviation.

There hasn't been any deviation in Venus' purposeful march. She has won 19 straight matches at Wimbledon, 32 consecutive sets. "Her tennis is so powerful," Radwanska said of Venus, "She's playing so flat (with no spin and little bounce to the ball), and it's hard to do anything."

Azarenka was no less impressed with Serena: "She was striking the ball so hard and good, she really showed the unbeatable Serena today."

Sister act. One Williams or the other has won seven of the last nine Wimbledon women's titles, Venus in 2000, '01, '05, '07 and '08; Serena in '02 and '03. Last year Venus beat Serena in the final; in '02 and '03, Serena beat Venus in the final.

"Do I feel invincible?" 29-year-old Venus Williams asked rhetorically. "I'd like to say yes, but I really do work at it."

Someone wondered what it would be like for Venus to play Venus. "I have no idea," Serena answered, "but I guess the same way I feel when I have to face Venus. You can't give an inch. You have to be on your best game and hopefully she might not be on her best game."

Both the Williams ladies appear on their best game, a game no one else seems to possess.

"I don't know," Serena responded when asked what sets them apart. "We have a great game. We have strong serves. I think we have pretty good returns. Just solid all-around court players. I think we move pretty well. And honestly, I feel lucky and blessed to have had such a good coach in my dad, and my mom, to have taught us the game."

Some, perhaps out of jealousy, say the sisters simply were born great, tremendous athletes -- which they are -- but refuse to acknowledge the sweat and thought that has gone into making them successful.

"If it was that easy," said Venus, "we'd win everything. But it's not that easy. Still, I think we definitely are the front-runners as far as being some of the best players out there. ... I think the style of the game Serena and I play, we play better than the other women."

The Wimbledon style, matches before dark, changed Monday night when the new roof was closed, on the excuse of a brief shower, and Andy Murray took five sets to beat Stanislas Wawrinka, the final point coming at 10:38 p.m. local time.

Murray, the Scot, grumbled about the lack of notice he was given about playing indoors and the amount of humidity despite air conditioning. The BBC attracted 12.6 million viewers for the match, and there was a debate whether the broadcast network persuaded Wimbledon to close the roof and hold the Murray match last on the schedule, after many commuters had arrived home.

Venus, for her part, watched on TV long after finishing a fourth-round match. "It was exciting," she said. "The lighting, from the TV at least, it looked like daylight instead of playing under lights. But I haven't played under the roof, so I don't know what it's like."

What Wimbledon has been like is an old routine with new questions for the participants, such as the one to Serena, who has a total 10 Grand Slam victories, about whether she contemplates her achievements.

"Some of my trophies," she pointed out in denial, "I use for makeup brushes. Maybe I'll just take a step back and take all the brushes out and appreciate every title and every trophy."

But not after she tries to keep stepping forward at Wimbledon toward a probable rematch in the final against her sister.

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http://www.cbssports.com/tennis/story/11909419
© 2009 CBS Interactive. All rights reserved.

RealClearSports: Is Melanie Oudin the Future of American Tennis?

By Art Spander

WIMBLEDON, England -- She offered a glimmer, a possibility. Melanie Oudin reminded us there still are kids in the United States who want to be the best.

Kids who will pick up a baseball glove or a basketball, or in her case a tennis racket, and work at their play, driven by their dreams or their demons, as did the youth of past generations.

Wimbledon, the oldest tournament in tennis, the most famous tournament in tennis. The tournament in which at the start of the second week on Monday, there were numerous Swedes and Serbs and Russians and Swiss in singles. And four Americans.

Before early afternoon, the number was reduced to three. Oudin (pronounced Ooh-DAHN), the 17-year-old from the suburbs of Atlanta, was beaten in the fourth round by Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland, 6-4, 7-5.

The number was reduced, but America's hopes were not. Maybe after the great Venus and Serena Williams, now in their late 20s, somebody holding a U.S. passport will again be a women's champion. Maybe somebody after the retired Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi there will be a men's champion.

The major leagues have become the Caribbean league. "No rich kid will ever be a ballplayer," Joe DiMaggio was to have said half a century past. "You've got to be hungry."

Meaning you have to grind and sweat and practice. Meaning you have to give up the mall for the playgrounds. Or sandlots. Or clearings amongst the palm trees.

Baseball is the domain of the Dominicans and Venezuelans because they have earned their way.

Tennis belongs to the Eastern Europeans -- at the French Open, there were 25 women whose name ended in "-ova," the label of an unmarried female in those nations. "They want to succeed," a U.S. Tennis Association official made clear of the Serbs and Russians and Czechs.

So does Melanie Oudin, who although of French descent, calls herself "totally American." She's only wanted one thing as she aged: to become better than anyone else.

First you to have to make the commitment. Then you have to make progress. Oudin has done both.

"My goal," said Oudin, "has always been to be No. 1 in the world someday. But it's going to take a lot more work, and I'm going to have to get better and better. But I'm willing to work on it."

She began Wimbledon at 124 in the women's rankings. Now she's in the top 100. But is it only a temporary burst? Does she continue to move up, beat the Hantuchovas and Petrovas and Dementievas, or simply flame out and slip again into anonymity?

"I've always been mentally tough on court," said Oudin. That's a start. And she's quick. But at 5-foot-6, Oudin lacks a big serve and power strokes at the moment.

"She doesn't have weapons," said Jelena Jankovic, a former No. 1, after Oudin beat her.

She has the desire; as DiMaggio might have said, the hunger. She knew what she wanted from the time she was 12 and attending the U.S. Open at Flushing Meadow. "I always said I wanted to play in the pros there," was Oudin's recollection. No less significantly, she was playing in the pros here, at the 123rd Wimbledon.

"I didn't expect it coming into this tournament," said Oudin in reflection. She had to survive two match points the first round of qualifying. Then she beat three women ranked above her, two of them, Sybille Bammer and No. 6 Jankovic, seeded the first week of play.

"I'm happy with the way I fought here. I gave everything I have. I'm still the same person, but I think I've improved this week. I think I've gotten better as a player, but I'm looking forward to keep going."

So is the United States. So are ESPN, NBC and CBS, which televise the Grand Slam tournaments. So are tennis people around the globe because they know an American presence benefits the sport.

Oudin could be playing in the juniors. A year ago she was, but lost to Laura Robson of England. This time, Robson, in the main draw, was beaten in the first round while Oudin, the home-schooled munchkin from Georgia, made it into the fourth. And made it into the headlines.

"I'm, like, disappointed I lost today," said Oudin. One step more and she would have been in the quarter-finals. But already she has taken some very large steps.

"I'm very proud of myself, how I did here," said Oudin. "Now I can play with these girls, and this is what I want to do and what I want to be.

"If you really want this, I don't think anything will distract you. There are different things that I've wanted to do, but this is worth it to me. This is what I've always wanted."

What she wants is what America needs: a new face at the summit of tennis.

As a reporter since 1960, Art Spander is a living treasure of sports history. A recipient of the Dick McCann Memorial Award -- given for his long and distinguished career covering professional football -- he has earned himself a spot in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. And he has recently been honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award by the PGA of America for 2009.

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http://www1.realclearsports.com/articles/2009/06/29/is_melanie_oudin_the_future_of_american_tennis_96414.html
© RealClearSports 2009

CBSSports.com: Murray's marathon, roof closing mark historic day at Wimbledon

By Art Spander
The Sports Xchange/CBSSports.com

WIMBLEDON, England -- Andy Murray received his usual standing ovation, and the new roof at Centre Court got an unusual one. Overhead, under lights, with Britannia ruling and the Williams sisters rolling, this 123rd Wimbledon made history.

When Murray finally defeated Stanislas Wawrinka, 2-6, 6-3, 6-3, 5-7, 6-3, it was 10:38 p.m., more than an hour later than any tennis ever had been played at Wimbledon, where people once believed in the civilized idea of holding competition in daylight.

Until Monday, no match had gone beyond 9:35 p.m., which is when a women's doubles match ended in 1981. But now, with the roof and the lights below that roof, it's all changed. Play once started would continue until a winner was determined.

That took 3 hours, 57 minutes. The pubs were getting ready to close.

"It was pretty special," said Murray, who fell to his knees. "I thought Stan played a great match. I'm pretty sure this is the latest finish at Wimbledon."

He's got that right.

"Always when you play indoors, the atmosphere is great," he continued. "When you have 15,000 people cheering for you, it's fantastic."

Long before, Andy Roddick joined Serena and Venus as the U.S. entries in the quarterfinals. Although Roddick's match started at roughly the same time as Murray's, it finished two hours earlier.

If it didn't happen at Wimbledon on the long day's journey into night -- indoor tennis, tennis after dark, Ana Ivanovic injuring her thigh and tearfully pulling out against Venus, Amelie Mauresmo returning to her days of gagging leads, Lleyton Hewitt losing the first two sets and winning the match, the temperature getting up there in Miami territory -- it's probably never going to happen.

At last the roof, which costs 80 million pounds ($146 million), came into play, although truly it wasn't needed. But other than the glorious quest by Murray to become the first Brit in 73 years to win men's singles, the roof has been all anyone has talked or written about.

So as the thermometer climbed almost to 90 and the humidity grew more oppressive, it was a given rain was coming. The first drops fell around 4:35 p.m., and after the tarps -- or, as they're called here, the covers -- were rolled out on Centre Court, the sellout crowd began staring upward.

It didn't matter that it wasn't raining hard enough to delay play on some of the outside courts. The Mauresmo-Dinara Safina match on Centre Court was halted in the second set. Suddenly, the two sides of the translucent roof began moving toward each other. The sellout crowd stood and cheered, as it would later for Murray's comeback.

Radio Wimbledon even gave an account -- dare it be described as play-by-play -- of the roof being employed.

"The roof is moving!" the announcer declared. "It's a privilege to be here on Centre Court at this moment! It's almost shut now! It's agonizingly close to being shut!"

After it was shut and the announcer shut up, at least about the roof, Safina ripped a passing shot for the first point under Wimbledon's temporary dome.

Safina, No. 1 in rankings and seedings, came back from the loss of a first set and being down 3-1 in the third to win 4-6, 6-3, 6-4. The precipitation, slight as it was, had stopped. Would the roof be opened again for Murray's match against Wawrinka?

Not at all, and that choice allowed play to continue into the dead of night, because of the lights, and allowed Murray, the No. 3 seed, to overtake Wawrinka, the player from Switzerland who isn't named Roger Federer.

Just to prove the lunacy of the process, while Murray and Wawrinka went at it indoors, 100 yards away, Roddick was beating Tomas Berdych, 7-6, 6-4, 6-3, in the sunlight falling upon Court 1.

Not that he had any control over the situation, or that it affected him, Roddick was asked whether he thought they pulled the trigger too early on closing the roof. Tournament officials have decreed that, once a shot is hit while the roof is in place, then it stays in place through a match, even if there's no rain.

"Here is what I think about it," Roddick said. "If it's raining, they have a pretty good little weather system forecast thingy down in the magic little office there. ... I say if it is even sprinkling, at the time, and it looks ominous, if you have a roof, use it."

So it was used.

What Ivanovic, the 2008 French Open champ, couldn't do after getting thumped by Venus in the first set was use her left leg. In the opening game of the second set, Ana apparently pulled a thigh muscle, began to cry and then retired with Williams winning, 6-1, 1-0.

"I felt like I wasn't given a fair chance to fight," Ivanovic said.

Venus has won 18 straight matches and 31 straight sets at Wimbledon and seeks a third consecutive women's single title and sixth overall here.

The Sister Act still is proving newsworthy -- Serena Williams, on the other side of the draw, was a 6-3, 6-1 winner over Daniela Hantuchova.

"I was definitely out there not to stay too long," said Serena. "I'm a Florida girl, so I was totally fine with the heat."

As was Wimbledon with a match after dark.

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http://www.cbssports.com/tennis/story/11906045
© 2009 CBS Interactive. All rights reserved.

CBSSports.com: Second week, third round brings big tests, big answers

WIMBLEDON, England -- You could start with a pun, that with all the Russian women at Wimbledon, none of whom has won, it's over when it's "ova." You could start with the fact that Switzerland, famous for cheese and watches, has two men in the third round, while America, famous for who knows what, has only one.

Or you could start with the thought that the second week of the 123rd All England Lawn Tennis Championships has the potential to produce all sorts of tempting new stories but in the end undoubtedly will provide the same ones as in the past. With minor variations.

They're back Monday. Everybody who made it through the first week, made it to the fourth round, will be playing. After a day on which nobody played.

Which is why Wimbledon is Wimbledon. Or, more accurately, why the Borough of Merton, where the town and club are located, is what it is.

The residents need a break from the cars and crowds. The grass courts need a break from the players. The players need a break from each other, although they did practice, and from the media.

The other Grand Slams, the Australian, the French, the U.S. Open, go on through Sunday. Not Wimbledon, unless rain has tormented play earlier in the event.

That hasn't been the case, as you are aware. The new roof over Centre Court was closed only once, Saturday evening, but no one took the court.

In Sunday's Observer, Will Buckley, not the only one weary of tales of the roof, alluded to the television network and complained that the BBC "obsesses over a cover story that tells us nothing."

The third-round matches will tell us a great deal:

Whether Andy Murray, the No. 3 seed, the Scotsman, the great hope to end Britain's 73-year silence in men's singles (no champion since Fred Perry in 1936), can get past the other guy from Switzerland, Stanislas Wawrinka.

Whether Andy Roddick, the last U.S. male remaining in singles, has enough game to beat Tomas Berdych of the Czech Republic, whom Roddick said is streaky, "rarely middle of the road. He's either real good or not so good. Right now you expect to get the best of him."

Whether Melanie Oudin, the 17-year-old Munchkin from Marietta, Ga., outside Atlanta, can keep going on a miracle run that began three weeks ago when she survived two match points in the first round of qualifying and continued through a win over No. 5 Jelena Jankovic. Monday, the 5-foot-6 Oudin meets Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland, out on Court 18, the quasi-big time.

The other results we take for granted, that Venus Williams, trying for a third straight Wimbledon title and sixth overall, will whip Ana Ivanovic, as in the 2007 semifinals. On a roll? Venus has won 17 straight matches here, 29 straight sets.

That Roger Federer of Switzerland will thump his pigeon, Robin Soderling of Sweden, whom he beat in the French final three weeks ago, improving his record against him to 10-0. That's perfect, if you were wondering.

Britain's in a dither. The national rugby team was beaten Saturday 28-25 in South Africa, a performance that earned the headline, "Brilliant Lions Succumb to Epic Defeat."

The Ashes, the historic cricket competition between England and Australia, resumes July 8 in Wales.

And Murray is looking very much as if he'll be around for the last day of Wimbledon.

"Ice-cool Murray a cert for final, say stars," was the back-pager in the Sunday Mail. That translates as John McEnroe, Boris Becker and John Lloyd, Chris Evert's ex, predicting Murray will be in the final against Federer.

"I'd obviously love to get to the final," said Murray, classically reticent, "but there is still a lot of tennis to be played." Substitute football for tennis, and it sounds like a sound bite on any given Sunday in the NFL.

Venus, too, was conversant in the cliches. "She's talented and she does everything well," Venus said of Ivanovic, who has slipped to No. 13 after briefly rising to first following her 2008 French Open win.

Federer insisted the second week of a Grand Slam is when the tournament gets interesting for him. "Not necessarily," Venus responded when asked her reaction. "We think different. I take it match by match and figure out whatever I need to figure out."

It was reported that Venus and sister Serena, also into the fourth round, have been e-mailing Melanie Oudin, although they are only acquaintances through the Fed Cup team.

"They say things like, 'You go girl,'" Cliff Klingbeil, a friend of the Oudin family, told the Atlanta Journal Constitution. "Melanie can't believe the Williams sisters even know who she is."

We all know what Wimbledon is, the tennis tournament that takes a day off and comes back with a vengeance.

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http://www.cbssports.com/tennis/story/11903142
© 2009 CBS Interactive. All rights reserved.

CBSSports.com: Roof closes just for show on day of surprises

By Art Spander
The Sports Xchange/CBSSports.com

WIMBLEDON, England -- It isn't a $146 million curiosity piece after all. The new roof over Wimbledon's Centre Court finally was closed Saturday, although for no good reason other than to prove it could be closed.

You have a new toy; you have to play with it.

Long after the last scheduled match, just about 8 p.m., when there still was plenty of light and not enough rain, the huge accordion-like structure was activated.

Andy Murray, the Scot, the guy who might give Great Britain its first men's singles champion in 73 years, had finished beating Victor Troicki, 6-2, 6-3, 6-4. Andy Roddick had won his match. Venus Williams had won hers.

And it was long after 17-year-old Melanie Oudin, who was out there on Court 3, gave reason to believe America might have a female champion other than Venus or Serena Williams.

Maybe the people who run Wimbledon were weary of the complaints. Maybe they felt taunted by Mother Nature, a fickle lady who usually provides rain every year for the All England Championships but has failed miserably this time.

So, following the Murray-Troicki competition, with only a few hundred of the 14,000-plus fans still in their seats, the roof was closed and the announcement was made that, if needed, because of advancing darkness or actual rain, a match from Court 1 might be shifted to Centre Court.

Except the match on Court 1, between Fernando Gonzalez of Chile, the No. 10 seed, and Juan Carlos Ferrero of Spain already was in the fourth set and headed for a fifth.

It would be like moving a game from Citi Field to Yankee Stadium in the seventh inning.

In the end, the match stayed where it was -- the fans over on Court 1 would have been unhappy, indeed -- and Ferrero surprised Gonzalez 4-6, 7-5, 6-4, 4-6, 6-4.

Not as big a surprise as the 5-6 Oudin, playing her first Wimbledon. She beat a disoriented Jelena Jankovic, affected by the heat, 6-7 (8-10), 7-5, 6-2.

Jankovic had started the year as No. 1 in the rankings and had reached the finals of the 2008 U.S. Open. She's a world-class player. But Oudin, from the suburbs of Atlanta, literally ran her around the court.

"She's a short girl, and she runs a lot," Jankovic said of Oudin. "She doesn't have any weapons, but she doesn't make many mistakes. She made me hit a lot of balls, and I just couldn't do it. I didn't have enough power and strength to hit my shots."

Jankovic needed medical treatment after the first set. "I felt dizzy, and I thought I was going to end up in the hospital," she said. She also needed to get a toe taped after the second set.

But Oudin (pronounced Ooh-DAHN; she is of French descent "but totally American") didn't need to hear excuses -- only her own excited squeals after her biggest victory in 15 months as pro.

"I went out there and actually did well just thinking she was any other player," said Oudin, "and it was any other match, and I was at any other tournament."

As they say, anything that works.

Introduced to tennis along with twin sister Katherine by their grandmother, Melanie watched Venus and Serena from Wimbledon on TV when she was 7 years old and announced she would be there someday.

She made it through qualifying, saving two match points in her opening match a couple of weeks ago. And she has made it through three rounds despite her ranking (123rd).

"I've not played her," Venus Williams said, "but I was on the Fed Cup team with her. Just so enthusiastic about tennis. [For the United States] it's super good news."

Things weren't so super good for Svetlana Kuznetsova, the French Open winner, who was a loser. And then there was Jesse Levine, along with Roddick the only American male who made it to the third round but who, unlike Roddick, didn't make it out of the third round.

Everything seemed to work for Venus, a 6-0, 6-4 winner over Carla Suarez Navarro, Venus' 17th straight successful match as she tries for a third consecutive women's title at Wimbledon, but the talk later was that the roof had worked. As if Roddick cared about that.

"There's a roof," Roddick said. "If it rains, it closes. Beyond that, we might as well guess what color socks someone is wearing. I think the common joke is they haven't had to use it yet. All this money, and the weather's been nice."

It was fine when Roddick defeated Jurgen Melzer, 7-6, 7-6, 4-6, 6-3 in their third-rounder. Clouds appeared and the temperature dropped as Murray and Troicki were about to move on, having received instructions about procedure dealing with the roof. Ten minutes are needed to close, 20 minutes to activate the air conditioning.

"I obviously wanted to finish the match as quickly as possible," said Murray, who did that, requiring only an hour and a half. "It would have been a nice bit of history, I guess, the first to play under the roof. I wasn't worried about it. I enjoy playing indoors."

There probably won't be any indoor tennis at Wimbledon until at least Wednesday, according to the forecast, but then there's a chance of rain every day through the end of the tournament. Maybe that roof will get used -- maybe a lot.

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http://www.cbssports.com/tennis/story/11900551
© 2009 CBS Interactive. All rights reserved.

RealClearSports: 'Murraymania' Takes Hold at Wimbledon

By Art Spander

He's from Scotland, but the English will accept him -- if he wins Wimbledon. Which no British male, English, Scottish, Welsh or whatever has done in 73 years.

Andy Murray is the third seed and the first story. The tabloids had dozens of pieces on Michael Jackson reading front to back. But back to front, which is how the sporting public treats tabs, it was Andy Murray, or as they call it here, "Murraymania.''

Sports news in England is reported subjectively and patriotically. Losers are "brave.'' Winners "fly the flag." There haven't been many flags flying at Wimbledon, and so Murray, who in lesser tournaments has beaten Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal, is being touted, idolized and treated like the royalty he someday may meet.

Already, Murray has received congratulations from Queen Elizabeth for his win two weeks ago at Queen's, the warmup for Wimbledon, something he noted on his Twitter page.

"Got a nice letter from the Queen,'' he tweeted, "for doing well winning Queen's. Put it away from the bills.''

Murray lost a set in his opening match to Robert Kendrick, an American, which caused great distress among the journalists, who in England root as intensely for the locals as Americans root against theirs, with maybe the exception of Tiger Woods.

But Murray looked sharp in the second round and as he prepared to face a Serb named Viktor Troicki in the third, Murray had all England (and presumably Scotland) at his feet. Which is better than having them at one's neck, the usual fate of British athletes who sink to becoming brave losers.

"Murray in a hurry as the path to glory opens wide,'' was the headline in the Times, which limited itself to one gushing piece. As opposed to The Sun, which on the back page carried the headline, ‘YOU CAN KISS MY FEET,'' a tale of him losing wagers to his coach, one of the payments requiring pushups and a smack on the sneakers.

Murray very well might face Federer in the finals, which could even bring out the Queen, who hasn't been to Wimbledon since 1977, when Virginia Wade of England was champion. Her majesty has made no secret of her dislike of tennis, but she may feel compelled to be high-class royalty in the Royal Box.

On Friday, that area was occupied by such as Mr. and Mrs. Rajesh Batra, Lady and Sir Ian Miskin and the Rt. Honorable The Baroness Dean of Thorton-le-Fylde. Not bad, but hardly like Thursday when one of the guests was Dr. Iary Ravoarimanana of Madagascar, who has written a book on molecular phylogeny and taxonomic revision of the sporting lemurs.

What sport the lemurs play is unknown, but apparently it's not tennis. Otherwise they'd be entered at Wimbledon, perhaps as Murray, or multiple champions, Federer and Serena Williams. Each was a third-round winner Friday, when sun the continued to shine and the very expensive new roof over Centre Court remained unused.

Federer, saying he thought it was his best match of the tournament, even while losing a set, beat Philipp Kohlscriber, 6-3, 6-2, 6-7, 6-1. Serena was a 6-3, 6-4 winner over Roberta Vinci in a match that took just a bit more than an hour.

For Serena, the obligatory debriefing, in which she brought out one of those small, plastic Gatorade squeeze bottles and plunked it down just to her right, label carefully facing the front, was not so much about tennis as about Michael Jackson.

The British press needs angles, not to be confused with angles of volleys or drop shots. Wimbledon coverage alternates on two BBC channels from noon until darkness. Newspapers may not be flourishing here, but they're around in large numbers, and the competition among them is very real.

So, the very first question to Serena was: "What did Michael Jackson mean to you personally, and would you think about dedicating today's victory perhaps?''

Serena was both respectful and truthful. "No,'' she began, answering the second question first. "I mean he was great guy, a complete icon. Words just can't express my shock and horror . . . I think Michael Jackson, everyone listens to his music. It's like you think of the Beatles, you think of Elvis Presley, you think of Michael Jackson. Those are just lifetime icons that I've never forgotten.''

As far as the tennis? "I'm happy to have gotten my match over. I'm happy to have won.''

She'll win some more. As will her sister, Venus, trying for a third straight championship. But in Britain they really only care about Andy Murray. He's from Scotland. And, should he become champion, he also would be from heaven.

As a reporter since 1960, Art Spander is a living treasure of sports history. A recipient of the Dick McCann Memorial Award -- given for his long and distinguished career covering professional football -- he has earned himself a spot in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. And he has recently been honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award by the PGA of America for 2009.

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http://www1.realclearsports.com/articles/2009/06/26/murraymania_takes_hold_at_wimbledon_96411.html
© RealClearSports 2009

CBSSports.com: Serena's win secondary to remembering Michael Jackson

By Art Spander
The Sports Xchange/CBSSports.com

WIMBLEDON, England -- Serena Williams handled herself beautifully on the court and no less elegantly in the post-match interview Friday. On an afternoon when even at Wimbledon tennis seemed less important than a day earlier, her words were as impressive as her shots.

The news was unavoidable. In Britain, Michael Jackson was even larger than in the United States. He was to appear in a 50-show run at London's 02 Arena starting July 13, for which $85 million in tickets had been sold.

Nine of the first 11 pages in the Times of London dealt with Jackson's death. The headline in three-inch high letters in the 3.5-million circulation Sun proclaimed 'JACKO DEAD.' It was impossible not to know.

And Serena knew.

"I'm always online," she said."I'm always looking at the latest news until I fall asleep. So I saw it fairly early."

What we saw Friday on another warm, clear afternoon -- one that again mocked the idea of building a roof over Centre Court -- was Serena at her workmanlike best out on Court 2. She was a deliberate third-round winner over Roberta Vinci, 6-3, 6-4.

Then, hit by questions no one might have imagined at the All England Lawn Tennis Club, she provided answers both heartfelt and insightful.

Not that Serena, ever conscious of the commercial world and her endorsements, didn't take advantage of her presence. She sat down at the desk where the microphones sit and adroitly plunked down a squeeze bottle with a Gatorade label quite visible.

"What did Michael Jackson mean to you personally?" was the first query. Nothing about forehands or foresight. Only about a nearly mythic entertainer. "Would you think about dedicating today's victory, perhaps?"

Serena was prepared. She knows Wimbledon. She knows she's a celebrity, even if she tries to deny it.

"No," was her response, meaning the dedication. "I mean, he was a great guy, a complete icon. Words can't express my shock and horror. Just thoughts and prayers go out to him and his family. It's just a terrible, terrible thing."

Williams met Jackson some time ago. She reacted the way others react to her, emotional, uncontrolled.

"I think he was the ultimate celebrity," she said. "I think any celebrity who met Michael Jackson was completely in awe. I know I was. I kept thinking, 'Oh my God, oh my God. It's him, it's him. So for me, he was the celebrity of all celebrities."

And then the silly stuff. Not from Serena, who has won this event twice and has been runner-up twice, including last year when she was beaten by older sister Venus. From the media, which was looking for any angle.

"Can you moonwalk?" someone wondered. Her quick answer was in the negative.

It was another walk that almost threw Serena. There's a new Court 2 at Wimbledon. This one is farther away from Centre Court grandstand and locker rooms. The other, nicknamed "The Graveyard of Champions," because of all the upsets, was noisy and cramped for the fans.

Serena was six minutes late for the scheduled 1 p.m. start. She was waiting for the normal escort, and it never arrived.

"Well, I thought someone was gonna come get me," was her explanation. "Then I figured, well, maybe I just have to report. I didn't know what to do. So I was waiting, warming up. Waiting and waiting.

"Finally, I said, I'm just going to go out. I'm used to someone coming and saying, 'OK, let's go.'"

Serena is the No. 2 seed, but there have been times when Roger Federer, a five-time champion, has had to play on Court 2. He didn't like it, felt it was beneath him. Serena, on the other hand, didn't care. Although she said, "I don't think I played great today," it took only 1 hour, 7 minutes to move to the second week.

"It's not a court for Roger," she said of Court 2, "but it's definitely a court for me. But I haven't won Wimbledon five times. I really enjoyed the court. It had the challenge system [an instant-replay camera]. It worked for me. I actually really liked it."

The atmosphere is different. Those are the fans who queue to enter, the ones who have only grounds passes. "It's a big difference," she affirmed. "The fans are more involved. It seems more verbal. And it's fun."

The fun ended with talk about Michael Jackson, a sobering dialogue.

"Well, I think everyone listens to his music," he said. "It's like you think of the Beatles, you think of Elvis Presley, you think of Michael Jackson. Those are lifetime icons that I've never forgotten.

"I've been following him. He's not been well, from what I read. He's been in and out of the hospital. So I wasn't super shocked. But it's Michael Jackson. He's the greatest entertainer, for me, of all time."

Spoken by surely one of the great women's tennis players of all time.

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http://www.cbssports.com/tennis/story/11896933
© 2009 CBS Interactive. All rights reserved.

CBSSports.com: Victorious Roddick posts up, beats the press

By Art Spander
The Sports Xchange/CBSSports.com

WIMBLEDON, England -- The challenge came after the match, which is often the case at Wimbledon. Andy Roddick had won, but now he was being asked what he thought of the Shaquille O'Neal trade.

At least by the Americans in the interview room.

The Brits only wanted to know where Andy might dine in London. They didn't have much of a chance.

Not with a hoops guy like Roddick. He likes to eat. He prefers to talk basketball. Or baseball.

Andy won his second-round match Thursday, defeating Russian Igor Kunitsyn 6-4, 6-2, 3-6, 6-2. A stumble in the third set, a figurative one that is, but nothing that couldn't be and wasn't corrected.

"A win is a win," Roddick said. "The set I got broken, I had numerous break chances, and he got the one he had. I knew I was getting the better of him. Probably played my best set by far in the fourth set."

These are fine days for Andy. He was married in April to model Brooklyn Decker. The minor injuries that have affected him at times seem to have disappeared. Two others from his hometown, Boca Raton, Fla., Mardy Fish and Jesse Levine, still are in the Wimbledon draw. And the media continue to ask his opinions about the NBA.

The man knows his basketball.

"Well, Griffin is going one," he said of the draft, still several hours away, "and then it's going to be interesting to see what Minnesota does. I think they have, what, five, six, 18 and 28?"

It will be interesting to see what Andy Roddick does. He is two months from his 27th birthday. The years keep moving. Roddick for so long has been the one constant of American tennis, successor to the great ones, Andre Agassi, Pete Sampras, Michael Chang, Jim Courier.

Roddick has a Grand Slam title, the 2003 U.S. Open championship. He has two seconds, runner-up to Roger Federer here at Wimbledon in 2004 and '05. What he or American tennis doesn't have is a replacement.

"I'd love nothing more than for some 17- or 18-year-old to pop out and get in there, in the top 15 or top 10," Roddick said. "But you can't deal in hypotheticals."

Was it ironic or simply interesting that on another warm day at Wimbledon, Andy and 28-year-old Lleyton Hewitt, the Australian, standard bearers for their nations the past many years, each were winners?

It was expected of Roddick, seeded No. 6, but not of Hewitt -- a former Wimbledon champion -- who, having been idled by hip surgery the end of 2008, is No. 56 in the world rankings.

Hewitt upset No. 5 seed Juan Martin del Potro 6-3, 7-5, 7-5, if you can describe as an upset a loss by a 6-foot-7 clay-court specialist to a player whose flat shots stay low on grass.

"I don't think it's surprising," was Roddick's observation. "He's certainly capable of playing very well on this surface."

Very well, indeed. Hewitt was the Wimbledon men's singles winner in 2002.

A post-match session with Roddick is as fascinating as watching him hit those 140 mph serves. He is quick-witted and aggressive, virtues that are advantageous on court and in the interview room. He can fire one at you in both places.

There's an English singer-songwriter named Rick Astley, who Roddick, according to his Twitter, had on his iPod.

"I busted my wife on some of her crappy music," Andy said, "and she brought up Rick Astley. I can't deny it. It's in my iPod. And I'll bet it's in your iPod, too, so shut up."

When a Brit told Roddick, "You can get arrested in this country for having Rick Astley on your iPod," Andy responded, "You can get arrested in my country for lying under oath, so ..."

So what does he think of the Phoenix Suns sending Shaq to the Cleveland Cavaliers?

"Well," Roddick insisted, "it works both ways. I mean, Phoenix cuts dollars, and the Cavs have a big man. I mean, it was pretty apparent in the playoffs with Dwight Howard [from Orlando] that that was the part missing. Keep him healthy. I think he and [Zydrunas] Ilgauskas will be able to spell each other.

"There's going to an adjustment period with a 7-3, 350-pounder in the middle ... but it's only going to make the team better."

What will make Andy Roddick better? Where might he be had Roger Federer not arrived at virtually the same time, Federer twice at Wimbledon and once in the U.S. Open beating him in finals?

It's one of those intriguing questions that can be debated forever. But you can't deal in the hypothetical. Andy told us that. And a lot more.

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http://www.cbssports.com/tennis/story/11892894
© 2009 CBS Interactive. All rights reserved.

RealClearSports: Wimbledon Is In a 'Grass' by Itself

WIMBLEDON, England -- It's different here, even if the language is the same. Forget that idea the Brits are charming, diplomatic if you will. This is the original place where people tell it like it is, and no apologies to Howard Cosell -- or at least, how they think it is.

It was the third day of Wimbledon, the oldest of sporting competitions, going back to the 1870s, and the sun was shining -- that new roof over Centre Court still is unused -- and the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club grounds were chock-a-block with fans, more than 40,000 of them.

Roger Federer and Serena Williams, as expected, won their second-round matches on this fine Wednesday and Maria Sharapova, still working her way back from that shoulder injury, lost hers.

Tennis on grass courts. A festival more than a sporting event.

The desire is to get tickets for the semifinals or finals, still more than a week away, but the best of Wimbledon is found in the early rounds, when the weather is fine and matches literally are taking place at every one of the 19 courts. It's a show worthy of anything on the stages of the West End theaters.

It's different here. The ad for Sure deodorant on the car of the District Line train shows a woman with an upraised arm, clutching a pole with the words, "...twice the protection against sweat." Not perspiration. Not wetness. Sweat.

They don't sweat the use of prepositions. The sign at an intersection near the tennis complex tells motorists there is "No waiting in Bathgate Road," while another nearby warns "No alcohol on the stands.''

If baseball were popular here, would a walk would mean putting a runner "in" first base?

What we call an ATM, they call a cash machine, not to be confused with Pat Cash, who was a machine of sorts when he won men's singles in 1987. What we describe as a cell phone, they list as mobile phone. A seafood market remains a fishmonger.

And what would some states' beverage control units think of giving away small cups of beer, "Honey Dew, the United Kingdom's organic beer," to people walking the mile from the Southfields station to the Wimbledon grounds?

Serena Williams drinks something else. At least in public. Gatorade, or as promoted in those new commercials, "G." When Serena, the No. 2 seed, sat down for an interview after an easy, 6-2, 6-1, triumph over Jarmila Groth, she was wearing an orange T-shirt with a Nike swoosh logo large enough to cover Texas.

Then from her gym bag she lifted a bottle of "G" and placed it near the microphone, as to be better seen on television.

The sports drink is distributed in Britain, but not as widely as, say, Twinings tea.

At age 27, winner of 10 Grand Slam championships, Serena is creating a television script of her life. "I call it 'my treatment,' so I'm working on my treatment now," she said. "I was going to do it Tuesday, but I started watching 'Dexter' and got sidetracked."

She's missed a few forehands in her life, now Serena has to worry about missing deadlines?

What Wimbledon has been missing early on is compelling stories. The roof has been a non-issue. Except for Sharapova, the favorites won. Maybe that's why in this country of legalized gambling an unfounded report a match may have been fixed took on a life of its own.

An Austrian named Jurgen Melzer defeated Wayne Odesnik, an American, 6-1, 6-4, 6-2, which, since Melzer is seeded, if at No. 26, and Odesnik is not, shouldn't have been terribly surprising.

But just before the match began, the bookmaker Betfair said it received more than six times as many wagers as it normally would, and Betfair spokesman Mark Davies said the odds on Melzer "shortened significantly."

There was a simple explanation. One of the television commentators, apparently for the BBC, pointed out before the first shot that Odesnik had a thigh injury. You can just picture the gamblers in the pubs or at home rubbing their hands today and greedily laying down a few quid on Melzer.

Betfair received about $980,000 in wagers on the match, Davies said; the average for a first-round match at Wimbledon is less than $163,000.

"It's being reported as potential corruption, but I don't see it that way at all," Davies told The Associated Press. "I doubt that there was any wrongdoing."

But there was plenty of hyperventilating, worry if you will. Or as it's described in England, people getting a twist in their knickers. Maybe Serena could work it into her script.

As a reporter since 1960, Art Spander is a living treasure of sports history. A recipient of the Dick McCann Memorial Award -- given for his long and distinguished career covering professional football -- he has earned himself a spot in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. And he has recently been honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award by the PGA of America for 2009.

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http://www1.realclearsports.com/articles/2009/06/24/wimbledon_is_in_a_grass_by_itself_96408.html
© RealClearSports 2009

CBSSports.com: Sharapova stumbles but optimistically looks toward future

By Art Spander
Special to CBSSports.com

WIMBLEDON, England -- She was the star of the show three years back in New York.

Maria Sharapova won the U.S. Open and the timing was perfect -- Nike was running a commercial that featured her as a woman of means, with accompaniment by the song I Feel Pretty from Westside Story.

Yep, Sharapova is going home early again but her passion to improve is as strong as ever. (Getty Images)   These days the only music that fits Sharapova is the blues. She has learned the hard way about an athlete's vulnerability, that at any moment she can be betrayed by her body.

That, as we've heard so many times, you're only one injury away from the end of a career.

Sharapova's career is still going, but her stay at this year's Wimbledon is over. In what accurately can be described as a comeback, Sharapova hasn't come back far enough.

Given a gift seed of 24 because of her presence rather than her recent record, Sharapova was beaten Wednesday in the second round, 6-2, 3-6, 6-4, by Gisela Dulko of Argentina.

Tennis is a tough sport on young women. Virtually all the great ones of late -- Steffi Graf, Kim Clijsters, Lindsay Davenport, Serena Williams, all except the remarkable Martina Navratilova -- have been hurt. For Sharapova, who won this tournament, who won the Australian, who won the U.S., it was a rotator cuff tear in her right shoulder -- disaster for a right-hander.

She missed the Beijing Olympics. She missed the U.S. Open a couple of weeks later. She kept hoping the shoulder would heal, but it did not, and in October, like so many major league pitchers who have incurred the same injury, Sharapova underwent surgery.

Now she's undergoing the process of re-establishing herself, a complex process when you've been away for months, as was Sharapova. Now she not only needs to find the forehand, she needs to find the confidence.

"You just move forward," was Sharapova's philosophical comment about the loss. "This is not an overnight process. It's going to take time, as much time as it needs, as much time as I need on court to get everything together."

Time, that precious element. Football and basketball are governed by a clock. Teams run out of time. Athletes run out of time. Sharapova is only 24, but she has been playing for years. She used to look behind her at all the new faces entering the game. Now she must peer ahead, toward the players in front of her, toward the possible decline of her game.

This was only Sharapova's fourth event since rejoining the tour. Missing so many tournaments, she had fallen to 60th in the rankings but received a seeding because of her history.

Dulko, ranked 45th, had won just three games in two matches against Sharapova. But in this match, Dulko kept Sharapova off balance with drop shots, while Maria -- as would be natural for someone unable to play for a while -- struggled with the two essentials, the serve and the forehand.

Sharapova won Wimbledon in 2004, but that seems a lifetime ago rather than five years. If understandably arrogant when she was on top of the sport, not only because of what she did on court but with the Canon and Nike promotions off the court, Sharapova seems humbled and chastened by her fall.

There was purity in her observations. She wasn't trying to fool the media. Or herself.

"I had so many easy balls, and I just made unforced errors from those," a candid Sharapova conceded. "I don't know if that's because I haven't played. You know, I've had those situations before, and those balls would be pieces of cake, but today they weren't. But it's OK."

Pieces of cake. An American idiom, presented by a Russian. Who in effect is an American. She's lived in Florida for 17 years and speaks flawless English, flawless in pronunciation, without any hint of an accent.

The injury, the recovery, the agonizing work of rebuilding have given Sharapova a new appreciation of many things, from trying to find perspective to finding joy in just hitting a tennis ball again.

"First of all, you think of injuries as basically preventing you from playing your sport," was her reflection. "But if you look at the bigger picture, there are so many things that can happen that can limit you to doing things in life or even having a life.

"If you put things in perspective when you get injured, yes, my career is a huge part of my life, and that's what I do on a daily basis. So is it frustrating when that goes away for a while? Absolutely. But if you have a good head on your shoulders, you know that there's a life to live."

Just being at Wimbledon, reminded Sharapova, is an accomplishment. When you can't compete for months and then are given the opportunity to appear in the most famous of tournaments, there is a certain satisfaction.

"I had the pleasure of playing on Centre Court again," she said. "I didn't play on it last year. Losses are tough, more here than any other tournament. But it's all right. I have many more years ahead of me."

The shoulder is fine now. It sounds as if the head is, too.

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