The BBC doesn’t understand Wimbledon

The tennis is great, but an equally impressive aspect of Wimbledon is how well it has managed tradition. When I visited last week, the first time in a decade, everything was beautifully and reassuringly familiar. The clean thwack of the rackets, the running of the ball boys, the military-style precision and bearing of the ball girls. The portly line judges peering over blue-striped bellies, hands splayed on white-trousered knees, exhibiting all the concentration and intensity of a surgeon about to make his first cut. Naturally, one was the spit of James Robertson Justice.

How do they get the line judges so right? Do they hold auditions up and down the land, looking for Margaret Rutherfords and Captain Haddocks and the occasional Charles Hawtrey? The public spaces, too, are characterised by constancy. The huddles of kids hunting autographs, the floralled women and Panama’d men up from the Home Counties, the fierce-eyed tennis fanatics. The sight of the players walking to courts, supple and powerful, slipping effortlessly through the happy crowd, gods amongst men, always makes me catch my breath.

The queue is a fabulous phenomenon. I met some American girls who’d arrived at 3 a.m. and were tired and excited in equal measure, having secured top seats to see Alcaraz, Raducanu and Gauff. Strawberries and cream were much in evidence, as was Pimm’s. My sister and I paid a whopping £25 for two glasses, but it didn’t matter. This was such a very rare treat.

When Wimbledon has had to embrace change, it has somehow managed it without causing offence. It was a blustery day, and we were snugly protected under the retractable roof on Number One court. The ever-greater crowds were accommodated by the elegant new Courts Two and Three – and it’s easy to feel confident about the big expansions that Wimbledon plans for the decades ahead. There was a greater security presence than in the past – but the regiments of security staff were both unobtrusive and sleekly-stylish, giving a James Bondish frisson to the proceedings. 

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Overall, it’s plain that Wimbledon has found a way, over the years, to celebrate tradition without falling into stagnation. To make changes gingerly, incrementally, and for the better. Quite something in this age of wreckers and mediocrities – in which nonsensical change so often causes the heart to sink (looking at you, National Trust).

But, blow me, then Clare Balding came along and messed with the whole delicate eco-structure. By which I mean that a couple of days later, I was at home watching Wimbledon on TV and – before a Centre Court match – the BBC’s Balding, microphone in hand, imposed herself on a tennis-based experience and turned it into a celebrity-based one. ‘My goodness, look who’s with us at Wimbledon today!’ she boomed (I’m paraphrasing). ‘Behold this sporting celebrity! That sporting celebrity!’ The crowd was commanded to cheer and clap as the celebrities in the stands stood up one-by-one and Balding belted out their achievements: Sir Chris Hoy! What a cyclist! Pep Guardiola! Man City Legend! Leah Williamson! Hurray for Our Lionesses!

Where were we now? Texas? Butlins? Blue Peter on steroids? Wherever we were, it didn’t seem like Wimbledon. Celebrities have always turned up, but it most certainly wasn’t an ‘us and them’ experience like this; wasn’t a celebrity worshipping event. It was jarring and it was cringe – doubtless the latest iteration of the creeping Baldingisation being pushed by the BBC and other broadcasters. 

I’ve nothing against the woman and don’t want to be mean about her but I take issue with the concept of Baldingstyle TV – the enforced chumminess, the sentimentality, the turning of every quirky thing into a generic Baldinglike-thing, and the fact that Balding is omnipresent. Turn the TV to Crufts, and there she is going loopy about dogs. Watch some horse-racing and there she is emoting about horses. I suppose the Olympics are going to be wall-to-wall Balding. At Wimbledon, the peerless Sue Barker was forced to make way for Baldingstyle and its conquering blandness.

It was just about OK when she was simply the Wimbledon anchor. But is this new level of public showmanship a sign of Balding advancing on a fresh frontier? When Mary Berry turns up at Wimbledon, will we be forced to whoop and cheer for her soggy bottoms? Salma Hayek was there on Sunday; how about a round of applause for her celebrated performances in Ugly Betty and Sausage Party? This development smacks of some accessibility initiative, the outcome of a thousand self-congratulatory BBC meetings.

We have a clash of cultures here. Wimbledon-pure, done with grace, sensitivity and respect for tennis’s idiosyncrasies and traditions. And BBC-influenced Wimbledon, galumphing into a brave new sporting world that cares less for tennis and more for inclusivity objectives. Let’s hope that the Wimbledon side recognises that it is the stronger, and tells the BBC Baldingites to get off its exquisitely-clippered courts.