Middle Sundays, Misbehaving Men

00:00:18
Speaker 1: Her name.

00:00:19
Speaker 2: We are here at the Ole England Club. It is middle Sunday, weekend of Wimbledon. What an insane tournament it's been so far. We're up on the roof.

00:00:28
Speaker 1: You're going to hear some cheering.

00:00:29
Speaker 2: In the background as we chat through what's happened so far in the tournament. What are your thoughts asads being extremely overwhelmed by the amount of news that's happened in the last couple of days.

00:00:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, one thing I have to say is it's one hundred year celebration of Center Court today and so we're going to be celebrating that, and we're playing on the middle Sunday officially for the first time, not because of rain, so that's quite unusual. Caitlin, Wow, what a day yesterday. First of all, we lost a number one seed in Egersty on Tech, which was crazy. But Corney, you know, she manages to do this her two massive upsets on court One she beat Serena a number of years ago, when Serena was really playing very very good tennis and of course eager.

00:01:07
Speaker 4: Not super comfortable in grass.

00:01:09
Speaker 3: She was the favorite to win the tournament quote unquote, but for me, she was never the favorite she's not comfortable and grass, she's gonna have to learn how to play on it in so many ways, a little bit differently with her movement, with her shot selection, et cetera. And Corne is a tough out. She's proven that, beaten so many top seats three years. But can we just talk about the men first?

00:01:29
Speaker 2: We have to talk about the women, because just to your point, Corney is a giant killer. I mean, for a minute there, she had a winning record against Serena. I think she beat her twice in one season, three times in one well not.

00:01:39
Speaker 3: In one season, but three times in her career, which is pretty unheard of.

00:01:42
Speaker 2: Considering the active players right now who have with multiple wins against Serena, the number is pretty pretty pretty small. But the women's straw is nuts. I mean, in that half alone, we have Krne tom Lanovich, Rebukkina Mortich, Badosa halip Anissimova, and Harmony Tan who somehow keeps winning these matches after you know, winning that nail baiter against Syriana in the first round. Just a thought on that part of the draugh What do you think is going to happen here with the women? I mean, obviously the other half is interesting too, but that one feels open to me.

00:02:10
Speaker 3: Well, to be honest with you, how many tan beating these players is not unusual because I mean, look, she hits slice, she dices, she hits drop shots. She plays such an unusual style of tennis, and you know a lot of the women don't like it. Is reason why ash Barty was number one in the world. Not only does she have a great serve and forehand, but she hit slice backhands, and none of the ladies like to hit slice backhand, especially on grass, especially in the first week of Wimbledon, where the grass is a little bit longer, it stays low, and so she slicing and dison and drop shotting and tweinering and the whole. She's a little bit of on Jibur, but without the power. On still has the big foehand and backhand when she wants to and serve. So I think it's fantastic that she's kept it up. Pity there's no points for her, because her ranking would rise enormously. I got to give credit to my girl, Isla tom Lanovitch, because Eila made the quarters here last year and now she's looking like she may get to the quarters again, which is a great effort and really sucks because she lost is going to be losing all her points from last year, so her ranking is going to drop, which I think, you know an FYI did atpn WTA that was bullshit taking the points away. These players are working their asses out here, and I knows it's a bit controversial with the Russian players, but I'm sorry, like you shouldn't be penalizing every single player.

00:03:26
Speaker 4: But anyway, that's a whole different story.

00:03:27
Speaker 2: Well I could argue the other side of that, just because according to inside sources who I know who are at the All England Club, that was a very unilateral decision that was not made in consultation with the Tours. It wasn't even made in consultation with the government, and so they were kind of out on a loan on this. And I do think you're right the players should be getting points, the players who are here, But I also, frankly would like to see the Sabalancas of the world and the Medvedev's of the world playing this tournament, not because we're not condemning Russia and Belarus, but also because you know, most of these.

00:03:54
Speaker 1: Players would be penalized for speaking out.

00:03:56
Speaker 2: So anyway, we've discussed this before, and you and I have a respectful you know Teta tet here, but you're right, Aila, a tremendous effort to her to back up her great run here last year and have from you know what's not been a great season so far, a really really strong run.

00:04:10
Speaker 1: And while we're on the women, because we have so much.

00:04:12
Speaker 2: To talk about with the men in one of our classicism, what the fucks, the focks dick kicks might be in order, let's just very briefly stay on the women, because on the other half we have Murray Bushkova, what a great story, just got her college degree. She's playing Garcia, who's nice to come back.

00:04:29
Speaker 1: Mertens and Jibbur.

00:04:30
Speaker 2: We talked about Tatiana Maria.

00:04:33
Speaker 1: With a big one couple of days ago. She plays us the Penko.

00:04:35
Speaker 3: Can we give props to Tatia Maria with two kids, wins a tournament this year and now she's taken out some top players and she is the nicest person in the world, and she's got to play the Ostapenko. So we'll see if the slice and dice works against Ostapenko. But Ostapenko to me, will probably make the semis.

00:04:51
Speaker 2: Ostapenko's playing great. She had a really great run on grass before this.

00:04:55
Speaker 3: Yeah, she won Eastbourne last year and lost to believe in the finals to Kovitova. And just to back up what we were saying before, Bodoza Covidova match yesterday was the match of the tournament for the women. Even though it was two sets, the quality was out standing. And for me, Paula Bodoza, because I watched her in a previous match and she was played within herself, but it wasn't too flashy. The girl that she played wasn't that great and I was like, Okay, calm down, everybody. But yesterday, oh my god, she played so good and she is sneaking along very quietly. And it would not surprise me what I saw yesterday against Kviteva, because Kvitova won a tournament on eat grass, leading in here east Poe and as a two time champion. That was outstanding tennis from Baldoza, so it would not shock me if she was in the final here.

00:05:43
Speaker 1: Agreed.

00:05:44
Speaker 2: I thought Badosa and Kvitev could have gone either way at any point of the match. The quality was amazing. That agreed match of the tournament and Badosa. I mean, you have to like the fact that she took out Coveteva, who kind of was a sneaky feverite. I think to win this because of what you just said. So rounding out that half of the joil you got Hev, Heather Watson. She's playing Yula Neiemeyer, the young German who's a big server.

00:06:04
Speaker 3: I like to call her ever ever ever, that's how the English say ever.

00:06:09
Speaker 2: Anyway, So we've got a really really wide open tournament here.

00:06:13
Speaker 1: What do you think is gonna happen?

00:06:14
Speaker 2: You think? Butdos is the favorite? Caroline Garcia Jibburr. I mean, gabbur is ranked number two in the world right now. What do you think's who's got a chance here? I'll do, But who's the favorite? Listen to the crowd, they want my reaction. I think gibbur is the favorite. It's how she can handle it. And I did a really nice interview with her yesterday for ESPN in her day off and her practice. She's just one of my I just love her. She's very hard not to love for so many reasons. She's such a nice person, such a gifted tennis player, so fun to watch, so.

00:06:43
Speaker 4: I'd say she's the favorite.

00:06:45
Speaker 3: And I think you know someone like an Ostapenko who can be sneaky good when she's on and obviously a Grand Slam champion and Badosa after what I saw yesterday, But let's not forget about Amanda anissa Mova who took out golf yesterday, and and Amanda Anissimova has underachieved in my career and in her career, I think, in my opinion, but I think she sort of let everybody knows she's here to stay for a very long time. She hits the ball as pure as anybody hits the ball, so she can stay healthy. She is one to watch as well, so I think America and American television and networks kind of forget about her a little bit. We talk a lot about Coca goth rightly so made the finals of the French Open, but we need to talk about Amanda anisim Ova too. She's very young and I think her future is bright and it would not surprise me if we see her go through to the final as well. But we've got so many storylines on the women's side. Should we get to the men.

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00:09:17
Speaker 1: It's about time. Where to start?

00:09:19
Speaker 2: We have to probably start with the most controversial match of the tournament, So not not.

00:09:24
Speaker 3: Possibly the most controversial, the most it's gotta be one of the most controversial matches I've ever seen in my whole entire life.

00:09:31
Speaker 4: What the fuck? When you know?

00:09:33
Speaker 3: It was funny because in our studio at ESPN, you know, Chris mckendrey and all the girls, we were kind of like, oh yeah, and all those I mean, they're so emotional, aren't they?

00:09:42
Speaker 4: These women? Wait? What men? I mean it was a joke what I saw last night in Caught One.

00:09:48
Speaker 3: Nick Kurios should have been fine, should be fined so much money, and he should have been given so many point penalties yesterday for the amount of times he said fuck out loud. It was obvious for the TVBC, he was obvious for the fans to see and hear sits a past side and heard it. I mean he said at one stage at a set down and I believe it was for all on the second set and I think he might have been down in the game and he looked towards his box and said, I don't fucking care. I don't fucking care. And I'm like what, And it's he does care. It's just complete and utter like it's his way of like pretending he doesn't care, and everybody knows he cares. But the fact that the umpire didn't say, Nick, if you mouth if one more time, I'm giving you a warning and I'm gonna give you a point penal the and it'll be a game and it'll be the match next time. Then the flip side is sits a pass is hitting balls all over the shop. He's hit it into the crowd, he's sitting into the stands, he's I mean, it was a joke. And if I'm not anyone says, oh, they were acting like women, Oh my god, I'm gonna have it like men.

00:10:51
Speaker 2: They were acting like whiny, spoiled men. Curious in particular, could not agree with you more. If that had been nipped in the bud. I mean you could make the argument for the past couple of years had it been in it nipped it in the bud. You know, sure he's going to mouth off, Sure he's going to be emotional, that's fine. But when it gets to clear violations that are unevenly being administered, and you're right, Titsu pass was out of line, but he at least did get one point penalty.

00:11:13
Speaker 1: He at least got penalized.

00:11:14
Speaker 2: Nick, the performative stuff has got to go. Obviously, incredible talent, obviously should be here regularly. Whatever it is. He doesn't want to show that he cares too much. He's got emotional anger issues. Look, get yourself sorted, but don't put on a performance like that where you're screaming at your box.

00:11:28
Speaker 1: You're dropping off bombs. Kids are watching.

00:11:30
Speaker 2: It's clear violation and the umpire was not truly raining it in enough. I think that there needs to be As we've talked about many times before, you nip it in the bud. You make a couple of cases early, you do what you need to do to make sure that it doesn't keep happening, and you don't move the line so they know where the line is and to me, the line was crossed multiple times, and it honestly took away from what was a great tennis match. Ultimately, a very competitive four set could have gone either way tennis match. I think if titsu Pas wins that foreset, he played terrible in that tiebreak. But I think if he wins it, he wins the match. Right, there's no way out of five he doesn't regain the momentum and Nick sort of feeds away. So to me, the fact that there was needing to be so much officiating because these men were behaving badly, but also because there wasn't enough officiating, to me, was sort of the issue because it took away from what was a great tennis match at the end of the day.

00:12:15
Speaker 3: And there's one thing about personality, right Ili nes Dazi, John McEnroe sort of the past. Oh, we're looking for the you know, we want a bit of personality in the game. Hey, so do I Like I was a little bit of a nightmare on the court myself, But I tell you what, if I said fuck out loud one time, I'm getting a warning and maybe because the crowd's not there for me like they are for Nick, and sort of it drowns it out a little bit, But it's not the point. The point is if an umpire sees me say fuck once, I'm probably gonna get at least a soft warning, a stubs it. You know, what's your work, give me the wang, the weird bit of a wink wink, you know. But the amount of times he said f out loud and verbally obviously to see and.

00:12:59
Speaker 4: Then sits has spray and balls.

00:13:01
Speaker 3: I swear to God, the three of them, and I'm including the umpire should all be gone out of the tournament.

00:13:05
Speaker 4: I mean that umpire.

00:13:06
Speaker 3: I hoped it never gets another match during this tournament. And everyone say, oh, it's tough, Nickxon nightmare like to umpire. Okay, mate, you've got rules. There are laws. There are laws and by laws in the books that you go by. And you know, one of the things about sister about hitting the ball, and they said, well it didn't hit anybody.

00:13:23
Speaker 4: Okay, fuck that. Sorry.

00:13:24
Speaker 3: If you hit a ball directly into the crowd, that is an instant That could be an instant default, in my.

00:13:29
Speaker 1: Opinion, instant default.

00:13:31
Speaker 2: I've talked about this before because people were talking about when Djokovic hit the umpire at the US Open, a couple of years ago, like, oh, it was so unlucky.

00:13:37
Speaker 1: It wasn't unlucky if you.

00:13:38
Speaker 2: Saw Djokovic throw rackets and balls around prior to that when he was asked about it, Oh, hey you almost hit somebody, Hey almost somebody got hurt. Hey you missed that umpire at the O two Arena for the the ATP Finals by a hair And he'll say, oh, but I didn't, but it didn't happen. But and it's just if you abdopted a zero talent's policy where these people who are working the umpires, the ball kids, the linesmen, this is their place of work and we have to be thoughtful about the fact that there are rules and then should be evenly applied. And if that means you're afraid to escalate something because Nick Curios might go mental, then that's what happens and he makes he's made an example of and it's a it's a huge issue, but we move on and he learns to do better the next time. So for me, I love tennis so much and I don't mind the personalities just like you do. But the application of the rules should happen because rules exist, and you do it A couple of times you are really super harsh about it, and then everybody learns where the boundary is. Express your emotion, but don't put anybody at risk, or don't make a mockery of the sport out there on the grass at Wimbledon by dropping f bombs and you know, left, right and center. It's just it, it's beyond the pal So I agree with you. All three of them tossed out of the tournament.

00:14:42
Speaker 3: And I heard that, you know, one of the rumors is that they don't put him on center court because of this situation. They don't want him on there because of that. So you know, Nick, you're not helping yourself either. But maybe he likes playing on court one. And you know, I talked to sits past prior to the tournament about playing on center cord and how meaningful that would be to be the first Greek to be on that cord, and he probably fell bit slighter at not being on the court, to be honest with you, And it was sad not to have that opportunity to be the first Greek to be on that court in the one hundred year celebration. Yeah, so very very disgusting disgrace all from all, and apparently the referee told the umpire, hey, give him a warning, and the umpire didn't do it, So what the hell Like? Anyway, I could talk about disastrous umpires for the rest of my life, and I could also talk about disastrous.

00:15:28
Speaker 4: Tennis players for the rest of my life.

00:15:29
Speaker 3: But another little controversy that happened on Senate Court with I mean, let's face it, probably one of my favorites of all time is Raphael Nadal. He is up a set two sets of love four two, and apparently Sonigo asked for the roof to be closed because it was getting dark. But there's no doubt they had a couple of games up their sleeve that they and Ruffa was probably thinking, mate, I'm gonna finish you off in a couple of games.

00:15:51
Speaker 4: Let's just get out of here. But then they closed the roof.

00:15:54
Speaker 3: And then when the roof came closed, Sonigo played a bit of a good game to break Raffa, and Raffa was a bit pissed off, I think, And apparently Sonigo, you know, he's got quite the grunt on him, and you know, I think Raffa was a little bit annoyed about the length of grunts and it was a bit of a hindrance. So apparently he I know he did. He calls Sonago up from the baseline to the net to have a little conversation about it. Was like, listen, Daddy needs to talk to you. Come up here. I'm going to tell you where things up, and apparently said listen, you go and talk to the umpire. Now, I love Ruffa, but that's so out of line, Like that's a that was out of line. And then and then at the net after the match, they had this long conversation and looked terrible. So that's a check mark on Rafa being out of line there. And I love Raffa and I know he tries to maybe like handle it between the boys kind of thing, but that was out of line from Raffa and it didn't look good.

00:16:48
Speaker 1: I agree with you.

00:16:48
Speaker 2: I think that's what the umpire's for. If you have an issue with what your opponent is doing, talk to the empire. If you don't think the roof should be closed, which by the way, takes what six seven minutes, it is a bit of a disruption and play and if you have more games to go. Anybody who's been up looking within closing and then starts to feel a few rain drops.

00:17:03
Speaker 3: Or yeah, like John isna the other day against Murray, it's like, are you joking? I'm like two service games which take all of about forty five seconds to get through, and now you're going to close the roof. But John just took it in his stride and I'm not winning.

00:17:12
Speaker 2: Great, so you can get over it as a tennis player, but it is obviously a bit of a disruption to say like, oh, we're almost so close to the finish line, can we just finish? So I get why that's a bit of a you know, a momentum killer and you know, a bit of shift and energy.

00:17:23
Speaker 1: That's said.

00:17:24
Speaker 2: The umpires exist and should be doing their jobs such that you can say, hey listen, I don't want the roof closed, or hey listen, his grunt is now a hindrance, which is a little bit rich coming from Rafo.

00:17:32
Speaker 1: Just because his grunt is also not nothing.

00:17:34
Speaker 3: Yeah, but it doesn't prolong like son sone goes is so bad. It's like it's like, I mean, I don't want to get into it.

00:17:41
Speaker 1: It's like a two parter.

00:17:42
Speaker 2: It keeps going into your stroke, which I agree with you is where that is where the line should be. But I think we can generally say, Renee, as we have many many times before, men, get your house in order, get your shit together, well, seriously, get it together.

00:17:55
Speaker 3: I mean, we hear about all this complaining about oh, the women's handshakes and blah blah blah, and the guys are so good at the and I, you know, far out last night was just a bloody shit show.

00:18:04
Speaker 1: Bloody shit show.

00:18:05
Speaker 2: While speaking of being great at the net, I need to go catch the second half of Coco vandaway Alison Risk against one of the Chan sisters, Angel Chan oh Yama, who are double specialists and absolutely brilliantly competing out on court three. So I'm gonna go catch that with the Armitrage family. And I just want to say, Renee, it is a delight to be doing with this with you after I haven't been here for a few years. On top of the roof on a beautiful sunny day, middle Sunday Centenary of Center Court.

00:18:29
Speaker 1: What a place to be. This is truly magical.

00:18:32
Speaker 3: And it's sunny, which is, you know, a rarity. Although it's been quite chilly here in Wimbledon this year. Can we just get a little on the record of who we think is gonna win now, Caitlin, Men's and women's.

00:18:42
Speaker 2: I'm gonna vote with my heart, not my mind, and say, Rafa, maybe that's dumb because you never know. But as we've noted, he played and won the French on a dead foot, so anything is possible. Djokovic is capable of winning this tournament quite easily. He's also capable of pulling something totally random and who knows. On the women's side, I think head and Hurt says Onstubburr. I love on your rate, her variety, her power, she has it. She's now one as the favorite a couple of times, and on grass. But what I love so much is to me, there are legitimately four people who can win it on the women's side, and I wouldn't be surprised. And I think you're right, Anissimova is one of them, Bodosa, and look, you know Simona Hallip has.

00:19:22
Speaker 1: Won it before.

00:19:22
Speaker 4: Wait to sit on the fence.

00:19:24
Speaker 1: I mean, just pick a.

00:19:25
Speaker 4: Winner on all right.

00:19:27
Speaker 3: I think Oniba as well, and I could make the same argument, but Angibra and I think Novak Djokovic will win his fourth in a row and his eighth Wimbledon title, because you know why not. Men just keep breaking records. Caitlin, so joy to have you here. You're pain in the ass, but I still love you and everybody keep watching ESPN. I know you complain about certain things about it, but we try our best and we try and give you everything that we can.

00:19:50
Speaker 2: Oh and Renee, good luck in the legends. You've got a big mixt coming up. Any thoughts about that before we leave our audience with wanting more?

00:19:58
Speaker 3: Absolutely not, do not watch any of that on ESPN Plus. Just tune into the real tennis, although if I dive, I'll put it out on Twitter, I promise.

00:20:07
Speaker 4: All right, guys, thanks for joining us. Listen to the crowd. Bye.