Defending champion Vondrousova suffers shock first-round exit
Marketa Vondrousova’s Wimbledon title defence came to an early end as she fell to a surprising first-round defeat by Spain’s Jessica Bouzas Maneiro.
Marketa Vondrousova’s Wimbledon title defence came to an early end as she fell to a surprising first-round defeat by Spain’s Jessica Bouzas Maneiro.
Play has resumed on all courts at Wimbledon after Tuesday’s schedule was interrupted by rain in London.
Day 2 action at the grass-court major began at 11 a.m. local time (BST), before the rain forced 10 men’s singles matches being held on uncovered courts to be suspended at approximately 12:15 p.m. The players returned to the SW19 grass shortly before 1:30 p.m, however, with seventh seed Hubert Hurkacz aiming to escape some early trouble on No. 3 Court. The Pole resumed his clash with Radu Albot trailing 5-7, 1-1.
[ATP APP]Despite the weather, the action began at 1:30 p.m. on Centre Court and 1 p.m. on No. 1 Court, with both stadiums fitted with a retractable roof.
Seven-time Wimbledon champion and No. 2 in the PIF ATP Rankings Novak Djokovic will take on Vit Kopriva in the second match on Centre Court, before home favourite Jack Draper meets Elias Ymer. On No. 1 Court, fourth seed Alexander Zverev vs. Roberto Carballes Baena is the second match on.
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Watch as Paul Jubb wins the point after an exciting rally against Thiago Seyboth Wild during their first round match at Wimbledon.
Andy Murray has withdrawn from singles at The Championships. The Scot remains in the doubles draw with brother Jamie Murray.
After exiting the cinch Championships at Queen’s Club, Murray underwent an operation on his back, which he said “wasn’t insignificant”. The former No. 1 player in the PIF ATP Rankings has been working hard to try to compete in both singles and doubles at Wimbledon, but will now turn his attention to doubles.
[ATP APP]Murray owns a 61-13 singles record at SW19. He has lifted the trophy twice, in 2013 becoming the first British men’s singles champion at the tournament since Fred Perry in 1936.
This will be Murray’s third appearance in the Wimbledon doubles draw. In 2005 he partnered David Sherwood and in 2019 he competed alongside Pierre-Hugues Herbert.
Murray will be replaced in the singles draw by David Goffin, who will take on Tomas Machac in the first round.
[NEWSLETTER FORM]BBC Sport’s Clare Balding visits Great Britain’s Jack Draper to discuss his run at Queen’s, friendship with Andy Murray and meet his dog, Ozzy.
Emma Raducanu makes a winning return to Wimbledon, but fellow Britons Heather Watson, Charles Broom, Liam Broady and Arthur Fery lose on day one.
Carlos Alcaraz opens his title defence at Wimbledon with a hard-fought victory over qualifier Mark Lajal, while Jannik Sinner also reaches the second round.
Tomas Machac’s first-round clash against Andy Murray is one of the most-anticipated matches of The Championships. The encounter has plenty to live up to after their match-of-the-year candidate from the Miami third round in March.
The pair battled for a gruelling three hours and 28 minutes, making the occasion the third-longest best-of-three Miami men’s singles match on record. It was not just a long clash, but a dramatic one.
After rallying from 2-5 down in the final set, Murray rolled his ankle and was in agony. He returned to the court and managed to lead in the tie-break before losing despite suffering a full rupture of his ATFL and a near full thickness rupture of his CFL. Machac said it was “for sure the toughest match of my career”.
Now they will meet again on one of the biggest stages of the sport: Centre Court at SW19.
“It’s a first round at a Grand Slam. But it’s a special kind of occasion that we will play on Centre Court with the local guy maybe at the end of the career, playing good tennis,” Machac told ATPTour.com. “So this occasion is something special, I would say. But normally it’s a first round for me. It’s different, but I’m thinking like it’s a normal match on the big stage.”
As Machac said, the winner will only advance to the second round, not lift the trophy. But the eyes of a nation will be glued to every shot. Murray has made clear this will be his final appearance at The Championships and he just underwent surgery for a back cyst after the cinch Championships.
Machac will hope to take what he learned from their marathon encounter in Miami and apply it to the Wimbledon grass.
“It took quite a lot of time there. I was shaking because it was something incredible for me,” Machac said. “But after that, I was feeling much better on the court and everything was going welI. I remember that moment and it helps me lots to think about it.”
The Czech was shaking not just because Murray was across the net, but because there were big stakes. It was an opportunity to reach the fourth round at an ATP Masters 1000 event for the first time. He defeated Murray and then Matteo Arnaldi to make the quarter-finals.
One year ago, Machac needed to battle through qualifying to reach the Wimbledon main draw. He was No. 108 in the PIF ATP Rankings at the time and faced Cameron Norrie on No. 1 Court. He fell to the home favourite.
“I think last year, I was a little bit nervous from the beginning of the match,” Machac said. “When you are standing on this kind of stage against the local guy, it’s not easy from the beginning for you that you need to handle this situation. But I think I’m ready for that this year.”
[ATP APP]Now the Czech is World No. 39 and a month ago he reached a career-high World No. 33.
“It’s much better. It’s much better for me, especially when I played against Sinner in the quarter-finals of a 1000 [in Miami],” Machac said. “It’s much better 1719872551 that I have [played] these kind of matches. It helps.
“[I am] more experienced, of course. Then I think my game improved a lot. I’m trying to play with the best parts of my game, I don’t need to change something. I’m resisting to the [top players] quite good. So it helped me to improve in every way.”
Machac earned the biggest win of his career in Geneva, where he stunned Novak Djokovic in the semi-finals.
“Of course, with Novak, it sticks out, of course. These kind of matches, if you win it’s something that you will keep in your head for a long time, and it’s helped you to become better,” Machac said. “The match point I was hoping that he will miss actually. I was on the return against him, so I was just waiting for his mistake to finish the game actually.
“[I was thinking] like, ‘Wow, I did it. I beat the best one’. And after that, I was trying to be as quick as possible at the net to show him the respect that I will not lay down or something and he will wait in the net. So I was trying to show him the respect that I was happy to share the court with him and enjoy the game against him.”
All the experience has prepared Machac to meet the moment on Centre Court against Murray. All eyes will be on the Scot, but Machac will be ready to put up a fight.
[NEWSLETTER FORM]Jannik Sinner faced a tough challenge in the first round of The Championships, but remained calm to defeat German Yannick Hanfmann 6-3, 6-4, 3-6, 6-3 on Monday and set a second-round blockbuster against 2021 finalist Matteo Berrettini.
Top-seeded Sinner appeared in full control after two sets, but Hanfmann significantly reduced his mistakes to work his way into the match. Ultimately, the 22-year-old Sinner’s power and poise were too much for the former University of Southern California star in the two-hour, 58-minute encounter.
Despite dropping the third set, Sinner said that he was happy with his strong recovery, adding that he was delighted to be making his Grand Slam debut as the World No. 1 at The All England Club.
“When you go a break down immediately it’s tough to recover but how I reacted in the fourth set was very positive and ending the match in a very positive way hopefully can help me to start the next round,” the Italian said.
“It’s a huge privilege and honour to be in the position that I am and there is no better place than here to play my first Grand Slam as a World No. 1. It’s an amazing feeling, but every match starts at zero, zero and every opponent wants to win, as I do.”
W in Wimbledon 🤌@janniksin takes down Hanfmann 6-4 6-4 3-6 6-3 to reach 2nd round at #wimbledon for the 3rd straight year.<a href=”https://twitter.com/Wimbledon?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>@Wimbledon pic.twitter.com/48vnAiyJI2
— ATP Tour (@atptour) July 1, 2024
Sinner now leads Hanfmann 2-0 in their Lexus ATP Head2Head series, with both of his victories coming at majors in the past year. He dropped just five games to the German at last year’s US Open.
The World No. 1 made a quick start to the grass-court season two weeks ago in Halle, where he claimed his first tour-level title on the surface. Sinner has also played well at SW19 in the past, having made last year’s semi-finals.
[ATP APP]He hit a bump in the road against Hanfmann, who hit a backhand winner to go up a double break in the second set and grew in confidence as the match wore on. But Sinner never was in dire straits against the German and converted four of his five break points to move on.
The No. 1 Court roof was closed after the third set, further allowing the Italian to reset and finish the job. The top seed hit 16 aces and 47 total winners in the match.
Sinner will now ready for an even tougher test against Berrettini, the former World No. 6 whose hammer-like serve and big forehand have wreaked havoc on grass for years.
The Italian stars have been the faces of men’s tennis in their country since breaking onto the ATP Tour, but they have only met once. Sinner won their first Lexus ATP Head2Head meeting last year in Toronto in straight sets.
Looking ahead to his tough second-round showdown, Sinner said, “It’s a tough one for sure. He played the final here and he knows very well how to play on this surface so it’s a big challenge for me.”
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