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Welcome to the Wimbledon briefing, where The Athletic will explain the stories behind the stories on each day of the tournament.
On Day 2 of Wimbledon 2024, the rain came to SW19 on a day of tiebreaks, supersonic serves, and the first test of Novak Djokovic’s knee.
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A tale of four tiebreaks and one break on Court 16
There’s prophetic and there’s stating the downright obvious. On Monday night when discussing possible storylines for Tuesday, I said to my colleagues that the match between French lucky loser Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard and the American No 20 seed Sebastian Korda would be “tie-break central”. This was less a prediction, and more a statement of fact. Both men are huge servers, and Mpetshi Perricard in particular has not yet developed much of a returning game.
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In the end there were four tie-breaks in the match, with Mpetshi Perricard eventually winning 7-6, 6-7, 7-6, 6-7, 6-3. The only break of serve came in the final set, with Mpetshi Perricard saving all 11 of the break points he faced.
This was the seventh time in Wimbledon history that a match had had four tie-break sets — Mpetshi Perricard and Korda emulating huge-servers of old like Mark Philippoussis, Ivo Karlovic and Taylor Dent. Karlovic was also involved in the only match that would have had five tie-breaks had there been a final-set tie-break. But his match against Aljaz Bedene in 2018 was the year before that was introduced at Wimbledon, so the final set ended 8-6.
It hasn’t happened yet, but nowadays there could be a match with five tie-break sets, and Mpetshi Perricard would be a good bet to be involved should it happen — he served 51 aces on Tuesday, ludicrously averaging over 130mph on his first, but forced just four break points on his opponent’s serve.
Charlie Eccleshare
Swiatek survives a banana peel of an opener
Usually five-time Grand Slam title winners don’t think that the reward for winning a Wimbledon first round is playing another match on grass. But most five-time Grand Slam title winners are not Iga Swiatek.
Swiatek got through a banana peel of an opener on Tuesday, beating another Grand Slam title winner and a familiar foe, Sofia Kenin. Swiatek actually won her first of five against Kenin, beating the American in straight sets at the 2020 French Open.
Since then, their careers have gone in opposite directions — which is why Kenin was facing the No. 1 seed in the first round — but the American knocked out compatriot Coco Gauff at this stage last year.
No such issues for Swiatek, who notched a fairly efficient 6-3, 6-4 win.
It wasn’t perfect, but it did the job, especially considering it was Swiatek’s first match since the French Open final. She played no warm-up tournaments ahead of Wimbledon — a debatable move — but she needed the rest more than the practice, especially since she is headed back to clay later this summer, to try and win the gold medal at the Paris Olympics.
“When you switch to any surface, first couple of matches are not going to be comfortable and you have to accept that,” she said.
“But looking at how I’m playing on the practice court — I feel like I’m making progress every year, and every year is a little bit faster for me — in terms of the process of adapting to the surface. You can say I feel more comfortable. But it doesn’t change the fact that it’s going to be tough on this court anyway, because it’s a Grand Slam and you have to be ready.”
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Swiatek now gets Petra Martic of Croatia in the second round. Hopefully it’s an easier task than the second round of the French Open, where she faced Naomi Osaka and saved a match point before winning by a hair in the third set.
Matt Futterman
Shocks that aren’t shocks
On the face of it, there were two pretty big shocks on Tuesday — the defending women’s champion Marketa Vondrousova losing 4-6, 2-6 to world No 83 Jessica Bouzas Maneiro and the No 6 seed Andrey Rublev going down to the world No 122 Francisco Comesana, 4-6, 7-5, 2-6, 6-7.
Except neither was that shocking.
In Vondrousova’s case this is especially odd, given she became only the second defending Wimbledon women’s champion in Open Era history to lose in the first round. But she also came into the tournament off the back of hurting her hip a couple of weeks ago in Berlin, and she was a surprise winner herself last year, when she became the first unseeded Wimbledon women’s champion.
In the case of fellow No 6 seed Rublev, he’s not been in a good way since battling through illness to win the Madrid Open in May. He’s now not been beyond the third round of his four subsequent tournaments, and at the French Open exited after an unfortunately characteristic on-court meltdown. So Tuesday’s defeat to Comesana was hardly an outlier.
Matches like these are why, especially at a tournament like Wimbledon where the surface means results can be more variable, seedings and world rankings can only tell you so much. Intangibles like momentum, plus harder factors like fitness, are so key to players’ fortunes. Vondrousova, who sounded under the weather in her post-match press conference, and Rublev, who acknowledged that he couldn’t control a need to let out his emotions with anger, are among the top players who desperately need to rediscover a combination of form and fitness.
Charlie Eccleshare
Apostolos, can you tweet something like..?
Midway through his victory against Japan’s Taro Daniel, Greek No 11 seed Stefanos Tsitsipas was hitting his serve spots, making use of his forehand weaponry, showing solidity on his backhand, and … Tweeting?
To live a fabulous life, one must dare to dream, to take risks, and to step gracefully beyond comfort zones.
— Stefanos Tsitsipas (@steftsitsipas) July 2, 2024
(Camera) shot of the day
Not the way the umpire pictured leaving No.3 Court 😅#Wimbledon pic.twitter.com/giEZYwr2xT
— Wimbledon (@Wimbledon) July 2, 2024
Wimbledon men’s draw 2024
Wimbledon women’s draw 2024
Tell us what you noticed on the first day as things continue…
(Top photo: / Getty Images; Design: Eamonn Dalton for The Athletic)